One Rainy Night
by wofl1
Summary: Separated from his team Naruto falls ill with a fever while it's raining. The only shelter he can find is a cave that is already occupied by one dark haired person Naruto has longed to see again...
1. The One Encounter

**Disclaimer: don't own a thing... Y_Y**

**A/N: **rated M for a reason

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** 1. The One Encounter **

It was night in a deep forest far away from Konoha. Rain was falling down in cascades. The water was coming down so thickly one couldn't see much more than two metres into the woods. Leaves and branches were bending to the will of the masses of water. The forest floor was more than just mud.

Every single animal had retreated into its cave or den. Not even the most hungry one was out in the heavy downfall.

Two red spots were glowing in the falling water.

From farther away it was only a vision but following it through the rain it led to a particularly large cave.

In fact the red dots were eyes, scanning the area attentively, looking for potential intruders, potential danger.

A bonfire had been lit in the cavern but it had burnt down because of the lack of dry wood.

Coughing attracted the attention of the eyes. Turning around they watched another occupant of the cave.

The other person was clad in a black jumpsuit with an orange, muddy vest, which clearly indicated the other as male due to the lack of the right curves, and had bandages around their calves, connecting shoes with the pair of trousers. Fingerless gloves were covering the hands. A shock of blond hair was held back by a leaf forehead protector. Three scars adorned each cheek while blue eyes would be looking at the world if the person were awake.

The blond was tossing and turning in a fever.

"...Sas...uke..." The boy moaned in his fit.

The red eyes zoomed in on the blond in a hard stare.

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**Hope you liked it. I wrote it yesterday when I was in a foul mood... And read it again to add some things today when I was in an even fouler mood... **

**I can make this an about three chapter story. If you want this to continue even after the three chapters then tell me so and I'm going to because I've alredy an idea but I won't bother if nobody wants me to continue this... **

**Please read&review**


	2. The One Time

It snowed yesterday!! YAY!!!

Unfortunately it melted right away because it was too warm... Y_Y Damn temperature... Stealing away my precious snow...

**bluewolfeyes: **lol, you're going to see what's happening with Naruto and Sasuke^^ I... kinda... like that solution...

**Glarin' Gal: **Really? My grammar doesn't suck? That's good because normally it doesXD

**RinaMaeuschen: **Lol, I'm going to answer you in English, nevertheless XDD

Your first two points are so... so... so typically you, really! Making me happy although they don't say much :) and to your third point: yeah, you do know that I have low self-esteem concerning my writing skills... I mean most of the time I'm laughing my ass of because of what I'm writing... I think the whole time that it's so pathetic that only I'm able to come up with crap like that...

Ok, let's forget about this now...

But the most hilarious was when you wrote that you (attention, I'm quoting although I translated it) would be seeing me! I couldn't help imagining my computer suddenly developing eyes and watching me the whole time! I was soooooooo laughing my ass off! Ok, I know that you meant we would be seeing each other at school but nevertheless that image just sprung to life. Not my fault!

Ok, enough now, on with the story!

**Disclaimer:** nothing mine...

**A/N: ATTENTION!!! YAOI AHEAD!!! IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT THEN DON'T READ IT!!!

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** 2. The One Time **

Naruto was still tossing and turning in his fever. His eyes were shut tightly, his teeth clenched. Droplets of sweat were running down his strong neck. His hands were clawing at the hard floor.

It didn't take long for the whimpers to come.

The red eyes switched from watching the cold, grey outside world to the pathetic body lying on the hard, stony ground. Only moments later the eyes noticed the drops of perspiration running down the throat of the blond.

The eyes watched every single move the body made. The fingers clawing at the floor, the head tossing and turning, sweat everywhere, and those _hips!_ They were the most ensnaring thing there was at the panting boy. They were jerking and thrusting forward in a seductive way the eyes had never seen before.

And suddenly there was a certain gleam in those eyes that couldn't be mistaken for what it was.

The body that belonged to the eyes moved forward stealthily, not making a sound.

Suddenly Naruto turned to lay on his side, his eyes narrowed, one hand still clawing at the floor while the other was rubbing at his stomach looking as if he wanted to massage away some pain.

Immediately the body with the red eyes halted in its movements and stopped breathing altogether.

One wrong move and his intention could be lost.

But the blond didn't seem to wake so the person continued his silent sneaking.

In front of the blond the body went down onto its knees and stared at the other lustfully.

When the person was just about to touch him, the blond's eyes fluttered open.

Cerulean blue eyes looked around disorientated. When they focused on the red ones above him they widened in disbelief.

"Sas" Naruto began, but was interrupted by a hot mouth. A needy tongue was stroking the blond's bottom lip.

Naruto let out a yelp of surprise and his eyes widened in shock when the other was biting down on his lip. He opened his mouth automatically so the wanton tongue slipped through to roam freely in Naruto's cavern.

Naruto would have let out a shriek but it was muffled by the needy lips on his.

He couldn't do much to prevent Sasuke from turning him to lay down on his back again so that the red eyed teen could climb atop him.

Naruto laid one of his hands on the other's shoulder and tried to push him away but to no avail.

Without hesitation Sasuke snatched Naruto's hand away from his shoulder and held it down together with the other above the blond's head. Naruto tried to stop him but it was pointless.

The fever had weakened him too much.

The other hand of the dark-haired teen that was not occupied was opening the orange vest hastily and pulled it aside. After that he pushed up the black shirt to slide his hand along Naruto's taunt skin. It didn't escape Sasuke's notice that the skin was twitching expectantly and he couldn't help a smug smirk although it was hidden by the lips he still kissed passionately.

The Uchiha's mouth wandered away from Naruto's lips, along his jawline and down his throat with only some sucks and licks here and there to tease the sensitive skin eliciting goosebumps. Upon notice another smirk crossed Sasuke's face.

Naruto wanted to object something but at that moment the other had latched himself onto the blond's jugular.

Instead of protest a loud gasp exited the blond's mouth. Unconsciously he moved his head aside to give the brunette more room to work on, this time a moan escaping his lips.

Encouraged and obsessed with the desire to hear more of those moans Sasuke pried Naruto's legs apart to lay down between them. He was delighted by the fact that he could feel something akin to arousal between the blond's legs.

"Sasuke... Stop..." Naruto said, but didn't do anything to actually restrain the other.

Maybe it was due to the fact that Sasuke's lower body had made contact with Naruto's groin and was shooting pleasant vibes throughout his whole body.

Another moan exited the blond's lips but he was biting down on them as to not make another sound. It was just too embarrassing.

However, suddenly Naruto felt something warm and wet at his ear, licking and nibbling at it with passion.

Not wanting to show his arousal he could only bite down harder but it didn't help to hide his moan completely.

While he had been trying to ignore his obvious feelings Naruto hadn't noticed Sasuke's hand travelling downwards towards his groin.

When it reached the waistband of the blond's black trousers his eyes widened in knowing shock. He bucked and turned in hopes of getting rid of Sasuke but it was no use. The restraining hand and his weakened state were enough for him to be overpowered by the dark haired teen.

The blond noticed too late that he was wearing himself out with trying to get rid of Sasuke. He was already panting in exhaustion. Thus it was easy for Sasuke to cup Naruto's manhood.

Naruto's resolve broke away immediately. The next moan was breaking out of him like no other had before that.

The hot feeling the hand touching him evoked in him was too much to bear even though he didn't want to show how much he liked being touched by Sasuke.

But deep down inside Naruto knew that that was wrong. He couldn't like being touched by Sasuke in such a way. He would leave him and if Naruto liked being touched by him it would break his heart being left behind.

Sasuke started with soft rubs while he was again sucking hard at the boys jugular.

Finally Naruto let his eyes close, clenching them tightly, moaning out loud now, having no restraints any more.

The hot, lava like feeling coursing through his body, starting at his loins and throat were playing havoc in him. He couldn't stop himself any more from wanting Sasuke to continue.

He arched into the brunette's touch, but was disappointed when the hand on his groin and the lips on his neck suddenly disappeared.

Hazy blue eyes opened to lock with crimson ones. Only subconsciously did he notice that Sasuke was getting rid of his clothes, too caught up in the hot, red pool of desire the other's eyes were.

Once the brunette was done he lowered himself again between Naruto's legs.

Again those soft lips sought out his, his head held in place by a hand. Immediately his eyes fell shut again and he completely devoted himself to the passionate kiss.

One hand was stroking the blond's side, the other was slowly making its path down from his throat to one of the already erect nipples.

As soon as the hand reached its destination Naruto bucked and let out a wanton moan, Sasuke's lips moving down to tease the other.

As soon as the hot cavern closed around the nub Naruto threw his head back, his eyes shot open and he almost growled in lust.

Sasuke looked up to look straight into Naruto's needy eyes.

It was as if the blond's eyes were catching him because Sasuke was drawing close again to once again taste the hot pool of Naruto's mouth.

While doing that the hand that had stroked his side was moving to get under him towards the blonde's tight, muscled arse.

But before it came to rest upon it he pulled Naruto some way up the floor to be able to slide his trousers and boxers down with the other hand.

As soon as the blond's back hit the floor he moaned because of the cold stone floor, but the next moan that exited his mouth was due to the impudent hand that had slipped over his ass, groping it and getting the feel of it while Naruto was almost done for.

He knew he wouldn't last for much longer although they hadn't come to the _important_ thing yet.

Nevertheless a slick tongue playing with his nipples let him forget about that and he was again deeply immersed in the world of pleasure.

He immediately accepted the pushing fingers on his mouth and began to suck them like his life depended on it.

It didn't take long for the fingers to retreat and disappear from Naruto's notice but only a short time after they appeared at his arse again, searching for the entrance between his cheeks. Once found one finger immediately began circling the ring of muscles and dipped in slightly.

Naruto's head shot back in pleasure, hands gripped the other's shoulder.

"Sasuke!" He moaned out loud. "Hurry!"

It was getting close for the blond and he wanted to feel the other.

Seemingly encouraged by the other the finger slipped in completely.

It hurt. A burning feeling was awakened in his ass and it didn't go away. His muscles clenched to stop any further intrusion but it didn't make the pain go away.

Naruto whimpered slightly.

A nipping feeling suddenly appeared at his hip.

Naruto managed to open his eyes some to look down.

The image he saw was almost enough for him to cum.

Sasuke's head on his hip, his tongue out licking at it only centimetres away from his dripping erection.

Oh, what would Naruto give for the brunette's mouth sucking at a more needy place! To end this! To end this torture!

But unfortunately that didn't happen.

And then the finger began moving inside of him. Naruto let his head fall back again, his eyes clenching shut tightly and a throaty moan escaping his lips.

How he wanted for this to end! But how he wanted for this to continue at the same time.

This slow torture was killing him from the inside.

If he didn't get his release soon he would explode.

And then it became almost unbearable because suddenly Naruto saw stars when Sasuke stroked over one certain sensitive spot. He didn't even know that something like this existed but the heat and desire that little stroke had ignited in him made him want to burst. To show Sasuke just how much he wanted him.

His muscles were already clenching around that one finger.

Seeing that Naruto was too far gone to notice anything Sasuke added another finger. The tight ring of muscles immediately closed around him and yet another pained whimper escaped the blond.

The brunette looked up from the hip to look into Naruto's painfully clenched features. One decision made he lowered himself again.

The pain was merciless. Who knew this could be this excruciating, even in the throes of passion. Not even that special spot seemed to work any longer!

He wanted the fingers to be out of him! He didn't care if Sasuke didn't agree with him, but it hurt!

Suddenly something wet was touching the blond's cock.

Naruto immediately forgot about the pain and moaned, arching into that delightful touch. Rapidly, the uncertain licks turned into something more demanding and he swallowed the blond's member, humming until he was writhing and whining under Sasuke and the fingers could move again without hurting the boy.

Unnoticed by Naruto Sasuke slid another finger in, moving it. Naruto couldn't do much more than moan and arch into the touch, wanting more by the second.

He was going to explode, and that soon...

But before that could truly happen the mouth and the fingers vanished.

Whimpering at the loss Naruto managed to open his eyes only to see Sasuke readying himself. He pushed the legs of the blond farther apart and put one of it over his shoulder to get better access. He tenderly stroked the inside of Naruto's thighs.

And then the brunette began to enter him.

Naruto's eyes closed immediately, clenching due to the pain of the intrusion, his muscles not letting the other's manhood in much.

However, soft nipping at his jugular and teasing his nipples let him to relax slightly so that Sasuke could bury himself deeper.

It took some time to get the blond to accept him completely but a passionate and mind blowing kiss distracted Naruto enough for him to enter fully.

He waited for the blond to adjust completely before he set a slow rhythm. Searching for the pleasure point he had found previously, he gave some experimental thrusts pulling back out slightly only to enter him again.

Where was Naruto's pleasure point?

And then the blond threw his head back, growling out in desire.

Sasuke knew at once that he had found it.

Now nothing was restraining him.

He could pound into the hot, needy body beneath him without having to worry that he would hurt him.

He quickened his pace and hit the other's spot every time, a soft layer of sweat covering them.

Naruto began growling in pleasure, his hands long since gone into Sasuke's hair and onto his shoulders, clawing at him and digging into the brunette.

While one hand was supporting Sasuke, the other was sneaking down Naruto's body towards his dick.

He took a firm hold of it, making Naruto growl and moan even louder, and began stroking it simultaneously to his hard thrusts.

Sasuke felt the tight passage around him start to clench even stronger.

He knew Naruto was not far away from his orgasm so he sped up even more.

One passionate kiss and the blond spent himself all over their stomachs and Sasuke's hand.

The muscles clenched one last, strong time, almost taking the brunette with him over the cliff of pure bliss, but Sasuke managed to hold back, thrusting even harder and deeper into Naruto, staring deep in the blue eyes, almost as if to hypnotize him.

Just a short moment before Sasuke climaxed, he fixed his eyes on Naruto's jugular, canines having extended for about two centimetres and ramming them into the blond's throat.

And just then Sasuke climaxed, shooting his seed into the panting and willing body beneath him.

His arms gave out and he would have squashed Naruto if he hadn't managed to hold himself up on his elbows, panting hard and looking straight into the blond's exhausted eyes.

He laid down on Naruto, relishing in the afterglow of sex, while the other was doing the same. Naruto was absent-mindedly stroking the nape of Sasuke's neck, just where the hair began.

It wasn't long and Naruto drifted off to sleep.

Exhausted, the blond was snoring on the floor. The fever and their activities had taken their toll on him.

Sasuke was slowly and cautiously getting himself out of the arms of the other, not wanting to wake him, and stood up to go for his discarded clothes. He was watching the blond while he was licking at the one hand that was covered with Naruto's essence. He couldn't help liking the taste of it, although most would have said it was distasteful.

Nobody was allowed to like the taste of his blond idiot.

He was slowly dressing, watching for every movement the other made, for any indication that the other would wake and would want another round, however, there was none.

Securing his purple belt, he went to the blond. He looked through the things of Naruto's backpack and finally found a blanket, then he turned back towards Naruto. His eyes roamed over his curves once again before covering the blond with the blanket. Then he stood up and went for the entrance of the cave.

He stopped at the entrance and looked back at the blond one last time, then he turned back around and vanished into the black of the night, being embraced by it and devoured.

The rain had stopped.

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**So... Actually that was my first lemon where they went all the way (I think it is the...... third time anyone ever did something remotely sexually in one of my stories...I mean I have written about two or three petting scenes but that's about it...)... Hope it wasn't all too crappy... **

**However I DO think that it's bad because I wasn't really in the mood... Ok, in the beginning I was because this scene was what started this story but then I just wasn't in the mood (hmmmmmmmmm... let me think about it.... maybe it was because my dad was constantly nagging me about some thing or another so that he interrupted my thoughts and mood and what not...? NOOO, it certainly was NOT that... (caution, sarcasm!))**

**I forgot quite a lot when I wrote this... You should have seen my notes after I'd read this over once more... I almost thought: 'Oh, crap, just leave it and fuck this story...'**

**BTW: Did anyone notice that they don't really talk...? Is that a strange thing to do?? **

**So as I've already said before: I could end this in one more chapter... but if you want me to continue this just tell me!!! **

**I hope you enjoyed it nevertheless... **

**R&R**


	3. The One Loneliness

**I completely fucked up my Spanish exam today... But Ok, I have to live with that... **

**I'm going to warn you only once: My grammar will probably suck in this chapter (even more so than it already does) but I'm feeling like shit right now... I can feel that I'm developing a serious cold... You know the kind with a headache, coughing and a sore throat and all that shit... So don't be too angry with me for any mistakes you probably will find, ok?**

**bluewolfeyes: **Thanks that you noticed the thing with the canines^^ Almost no one noticed (or didn't bother to write it into his/her review or didn't write a review at all although he/she noticed it). But you'll get to know what that means (if I'm continuing this that is^^)

**Kisa167: **Lol, nice idea, although I won't say if that's what'll happen^^

**notperfectXbutXhonestcritic: **I went about three times to see if I wrote your name correctly^^ Who knows, maybe I did the 'they-don't-talk-with-each-other-thing' on purpose (although then I don't know about it and only subconsciously XD) and thanks for you liking it... I thought (and still think) it's bad...

**RinaMaeuschen: **Lol, I'm going to answer you in English again^^

I still don't like my lemon... But you will find out what the 'bite' means (if I'm going to continue bla bla bla)

DISCLAIMER: nothing mine... even though it sucks that nothing is...

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** 3. The One Loneliness **

"Shizune! Where is my sake?!" A busty woman with two blond pigtails screamed, hitting her clenched fists hard onto the surface of her desk.

The little pig that had been standing in front of the table squeaked and run off towards the corner farthest away from the violent woman.

Another woman with black hair and clad in a black robe came rushing into the office, a bottle of said alcohol in her hands.

Normally she was strictly against her Hokage drinking alcohol but right now she wanted nothing more than drink the sake all by herself.

Naruto was missing.

Team Kakashi had returned without him. They had searched for days and just couldn't find at least a single clue of him. It was as if the earth had opened up and swallowed him.

Tsunade was worried.

And not because he was the one who carried the scroll the enemy ninjas had been after. Neither because the Akatsuki was still out there looking for him.

She was worried for Naruto. Worried for the 'human' Naruto. Worried that something might have happened to him. Worried that something might have happened to the one person she came to see as her new little brother, at least in some way.

And because he was missing and Tsunade was in such obvious distress about it Shizune allowed her to drink the much needed sake.

It wouldn't extinguish the problem, but it would help her deal with the worry, with the fear.

It was bright, so much he could tell.

But somehow his eyelids were feeling so heavy. He just couldn't seem to be able to open them.

He could hear birds singing happily.

Why was his bed so uncomfortable?

He knew that his bed wasn't really that nice but normally it wasn't this bad. Or had he just returned form a mission, heavy wounded and had a bad back and therefore his bed felt more uncomfortable than normal?

He could smell wet wood and mud. Not to forget the fresh morning breeze, stroking his face slightly.

And why the hell was he sleeping naked?

Normally he wouldn't do that.

So what had happened?

"Report" Tsunade snapped once she noticed the ANBU.

"Nothing, Lady Tsunade." The ANBU replied.

"Damn it." She muttered and dismissed the ninja.

It wasn't as if only ANBU were searching for the brat, to be honest a quarter of the whole ninjas currently being in Konoha were out there searching for him, but still, there was nothing.

This was not good.

Tsunade had a bad feeling...

The Akatsuki were still out there, hunting down the last jinchuuriki, although their number was decimated.

Tsunade had a very bad feeling...

Within seconds Naruto bolted upright.

He had tumbled into the cave, searching for shelter while having a fever but Sasuke was already occupying the one he had found.

And then the bastard had fucked him! Senseless!

The nerve of him!

Naruto was looking around angrily.

When he got his hands on him...!

And then he noticed it.

Sasuke wasn't there any more.

Immediately Naruto's face fell.

He smiled a sad smile, looking out of the entrance of the cave.

He had known that Sasuke wouldn't stay.

Had he left as soon as Naruto had fallen asleep? Or had he stayed behind to watch him sleep? Simply to look at him for some more time? Or to make sure that Naruto's fever had gone down? But then he shouldn't have fucked him in the first place, that bastard...

Where could he be right now?

He so had known that he couldn't trust him to stay with him. He had known that Sasuke wasn't done with whatever it was he was doing currently.

Maybe he didn't even want to return after he was done with whatever it was.

And the possibility of that broke Naruto's heart.

He hadn't expected the brunette to... fuck him – there was no other term that could be used for what he had done – because Naruto just didn't believe that Sasuke truly wanted that...

Although that let the question open why he had done him...

Naruto couldn't believe that Sasuke was attracted to him, so why?

And now, being alone here in this cave, without Sasuke, it was tearing his heart apart.

Naruto didn't even realize the tears streaming down his face.

"Why did you lose him in the first place?" Tsunade raged again, glaring at Kakashi, Sai and Sakura.

Surprisingly Kakashi wasn't reading his porn, instead of that he stood straight, giving Sakura some comfort, even though it was in a twisted way.

It indicated that she wasn't the only one who felt guilty and was worried.

All of Naruto's friends who weren't already out on a mission were now taking part in the search party. Every last one of them was afraid something might have happened to him.

"As I've already told you we were fighting several enemy shinobi. Somehow they must have managed to lure us apart because once they were all dead there was no sign of Naruto." Kakashi answered.

"Is there no other detail that you've just forgotten to mention?" Tsunade wanted to know indignantly.

"Like I've said before: It was as if Naruto had disappeared into thin air. The fact that it had been raining the whole time didn't help any. It has washed away any clues that would have been there."

"Damn it all! Shizune! Where is my sake?!" Tsunade demanded to know.

"Right here, Lady Tsunade!" Shizune exclaimed, ran to her only to pour some into her cup.

That, however, vanished within less than a second.

"Next!" Tsunade commanded.

"I request permission to accompany the searching troops." Kakashi said.

Tsunade looked him over once.

"Permission given."

"Then I will do so as well." Sakura chimed in. "And I will help in the search for Naruto-kun, too." Sai said.

"You have half an hour." Kakashi said, looking them over before vanishing in a poof of smoke.

Sakura was the first to be at the gate of Konoha.

She was worried for her team mate. Not only her team mate but also close friend. Naruto had grown out of his childish crush on her and they had developed a deep friendship. She didn't want to lose that or him. He was the one who had helped her get over Sasuke.

The loss of him had already been a lot to deal with, but how should she manage to get over the loss of Naruto?

Not that she was in love with him or anything, NO, but he had become something akin to a brother to her... As strange as that might sound.

And losing him would rip her heart out.

She just couldn't let that happen! She didn't want to lose her other team mate as well. That would kill her.

Surprisingly it was Kakashi who was next in line.

It was rare for the copy-nin to be on time.

So it had to be important to him as well.

Whether he felt the same way as Sakura did? Losing another student would kill him?

At least that would explain his punctuality.

He only did appear on time if it was important. Looking for a lost student was more than important, at least it appeared to be so.

Sai was the last to make his entrance.

For him it was also important that the blond would return sound and safe.

Naruto had been the first one to develop a serious bond with him. He had shown him how to care for others – and most importantly: He had shown him how to smile, something Sai had tried to accomplish for several years on his own, having forgotten – or never learned – how to do that.

It wouldn't be good for his already quite twisted psyche to lose his first bond outside of ROOT.

"Everything ready?" Kakashi asked.

Both Sakura and Sai nodded their heads.

"Then let's-"

"Hey, there is someone approaching Konoha!" Izumo, who was in charge of gate watch, shouted.

Team Kakashi turned around to ascertain if that person was a threat.

It took them some time to be able to recognize the person.

Then they stared.

Running towards them was a human being clad in the typical black clothes of a shinobi and a strange, orange vest. The most significant about that person, however, was the neon yellow hair.

Naruto was panting.

He still hadn't recovered completely from his fever.

But nonetheless he had managed to reach Konoha.

And if he wasn't completely mistaken then he could see Team Kakashi standing at the front gates.

Were they waiting for him? Or were they going to search for him?

Strength was leaving the blond.

But he had to make it to Konoha. He had gotten so far. He just couldn't break down here now, only some hundred metres away from it!

Suddenly he felt arms going around him, a voice beginning in a high pitched tone to cry and babble.

Naruto inhaled deeply.

Sakura...

So he had made it...

He was home again...

Home, surrounded by hundreds, but nevertheless alone...

The bastard hadn't come home...

He had left him.

Once and for all?

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**Hope you liked it... And sorry for the depressive Naruto... But I don't think anybody knows how he would react if Sasuke truly left him after a night together. But I promise he'll get better!**

**Originally I planned to end this story right here... But who knows? Maybe I'm going to continue? **

**Also: If (ok, it's probably a 'when' because already a lot of people said that they wanted for this story to continue) I'm going to continue then the updates won't be as frequent as they currently are because LIFE SUCKS and won't allow me to write as much as I want to... ****(right now for example I shouldn't be writing a chapter for One Rainy Night and instead I should learn for my English exam...) **


	4. The One Problem

**Hi guys! Surprise, surprise! I'm going to continue this story! (I really had no option left with all the votes^^) **

**I think I fucked up my English exam... I was coughing up my lungs the whole time (believe me that's not a nice thing...) and I was done with it too soon... There goes my good English grade Y_Y I don't know who of you knows the book 'Brave New World' by Aldous Huxley (I hate that book but that's probably because we had to read it in school... I hate books we have to read in school...Y__Y) We had to write a letter to the Director of Hatchery London (or something like that...) in our third task whether or not agreed with the conditioning... I told him in my letter that I totally disagreed and then I began ranting about PUPPETS, PUPPETEERS( I soooo had to think of Sasori....) and SOULS!!! How stupid is that? Probably the influence of my cold... V_V **

**At least my English teacher can't say that I wasn't inventive...**

**RinaMaeuschen:** I can't believe it! A review in English! I never thought that that would happen with the way you always talk about your bad English^^

I promise the sad Naruto isn't going to be permanent! That's just not Naruto!

However, it's going to be very hard to get rid of Naruto's orange vest... You know with his favourite colour being orange... But I'll see what I can do...

**yourbabykitsune: **Maybe...^^ *grins knowingly*

**bluewolfeyes: **Don't know when Sasuke will make an appearance again.. Have to be in the mood... However I already have a scene where he will come back^^ But I think you have to wait a bit longer for that to happen^^ And concerning the markings: You will see^^

**notperfectXbutXhonestcritc: **Thanks for the good luck^^ However I don't know if it did any good... Y__Y

**CoCoBookmark: **Really? It's not OOC? I'm glad^^

**Disclaimer:** don't own anything...

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** 4. The One Problem **

Sakura ran towards the blond and hugged him close to her more than normal sized chest.

"Naruto! You're back!" She shouted, hiding her face in his shoulder and then she began to cry. "I thought something bad had happened to you! Don't you-" She began but stumbled upon her own sobbing.

"Don't you ever... ever scare me like that again...!" She finally ended her sentence.

"We were worried, Naruto." Kakashi said. He had watched his two students interact with each other, but hadn't said anything yet.

"Yes, Naruto-kun, we were worried for your dickless butt." Sai said.

He still had to learn a lot about interaction...

But if he hoped for the normal reaction from Naruto, he would be disappointed.

All Naruto did was smile and say, "Sorry to worry you", before his knees gave out and he sank to the floor, despite Sakura holding him, unconscious.

"NARUTO!' Sakura screamed, but he already didn't hear her any more.

"Where is he?" A screeching voice was heard throughout the hospital corridor. Sakura and Sai were turning around to see a panting Iruka.

Kakashi was leaning against a wall, reading his Icha Icha Paradise.

"In the examination room. Lady Tsunade is checking him." Sakura answered.

And then suddenly Kakashi had an armful of Iruka, who had his arms around the jounin's neck, hiding his face in the other's shoulder.

"You've found him! I was so afraid that something might've happened to him! I'm so grateful!" Iruka sobbed.

Kakashi, surprised that Iruka was in his arms, first put one of his hands on the other's shoulder, patting it awkwardly but he said nothing.

"God forbid if something had happened to him! I wouldn't have been able to sleep again properly!"

"But nothing mortally did happen to him, Iruka-sensei. You can be glad." Kakashi answered reluctantly.

He didn't know how to deal with the over emotional academy teacher.

Iruka's grip tightened and he said, "Yes, I know! And that's all thanks to you."

Kakashi was too stunned to tell Iruka that Naruto had already been in front of Konoha when they had found him.

Naruto was just putting his vest back on. Tsunade was staring at her clipboard that she was holding in her hands, deeply immersed in her thoughts, while standing in front of the blond.

It seemed as if there was something that was troubling her.

"Your fever is down which is good." She said.

Naruto nodded his head.

"However you should take it easy for the next few days."

Naruto nodded again.

After that they fell silent until Naruto couldn't take it any more and asked, "What is it, Old Lady? You aren't telling me something."

Tsunade looked up from her clipboard and straight into his eyes.

"Come on! It can't be that bad." He said.

Tsunade sighed.

"You have four puncture wounds at your jugular that don't want to be healed how it seems."

Naruto looked at her questioningly, not understanding a word she had just said.

"Look, brat, it seems you've been bitten by something. However it must have been a human being."

"Why? Why should I let myself get bitten by a human? Don't you think that that is kinda... weird...?"

"I'm only telling you what I've found out!" She barked, then her voice got back to a business-like tone and she continued, "It has to have been a human because I can't heal those wounds..."

"But you can heal wounds caused by humans! Otherwise a lot of shinobi wouldn't be alive any more. So why should it be injuries cause by a human?"

"Simple, brat. The reason why I can't heal them is because right at their end in your body there is a massive amount of chakra stored." Confused, Naruto looked at the Hokage.

She sighed exaggeratedly and said, "In other words: The chakra stops me from closing your wounds."

"Then why don't you just get rid of the chakra?"

"Because, brat, the chakra seems to be sealed to your body in some kind of way. I can't get rid of it without harming your throat."

Naruto's eyes widened in disbelief.

"Besides that the amount of chakra lets me conclude that you let whoever bit you bite you out of your free will. You just can't be bitten and being pumped full with this much chakra without your consent."

Naruto's eyes widened even more.

Who should've bitten him?

As far as Naruto knew he had had no human contact other than the shinobi on his last mission and now Tsunade.

The last mission!

That had been when he'd met Sasuke...!

But he hadn't bitten him! They had been occupied with something else...

He just couldn't have!

But then Naruto's eyes widened in realization.

He did remember something at his throat some times and when he had been riding out his orgasm, he did remember some piercing pain at his neck.

But he hadn't really minded back then...

It had been enhancing his post orgasm situation...

So what if Sasuke really had bitten him? What did it bring him? Why should he do that?

There was no reason for him to do that!

But then why could Tsunade not remove it?

What the hell did that bite mean?

"Do you know who has bitten you?" Tsunade asked who had been watching him the whole time and therefore had seen all of his emotions flickering over his face.

"No!" Naruto answered, maybe a bit too fast.

"Don't lie to me, Naruto Uzumaki!"

"I'm not lying!" Naruto replied fiercely. "Of course you are! You do know who has bitten you, you just don't want to tell me! But I don't care! I don't like anyone biting one of my shinobi and leaving some strange kind of mark on him! That's almost as if Orochimaru has bitten you! The only difference is that there is no forming of a weird mark."

"Whatever. I ain't telling you." Naruto said.

Tsunade looked at him incredulously.

Had the brat just denied her her wish to know? Didn't he know that the bite could harm him? Didn't he realize that whoever had bitten him could have complete control over him now? Was he insane?

"So at least tell me what has happened, brat." Tsunade said.

Naruto shrugged, then said, "Good question. I don't really know. You probably already know that we were ambushed." Tsunade nodded her head. "It was hard for me to focus. I felt kinda woozy since that morning."

"And you didn't tell anybody?"

"Normally Kyuubi takes care of any illness so I didn't bother. However, after that I didn't have time any more to tell Sakura that it didn't get any better..."

"Because after that you were ambushed." Tsunade concluded. "Yeah and in my daze I acted stupid."

Tsunade fixed him with a stern look.

"Naruto, you **are** stupid."

"That's mean, Old Lady!"

"But it's the truth."

"Do you want to know what happened afterwards or not?" Naruto asked snappily.

She only nodded her head.

"I acted dumber than normally." Naruto conceded.

"I didn't notice that the fight was taken away from Kakashi-sensei and the others. They probably thought that I would be an easier kill if alone. I don't know if they tried to lure me away because they knew that I was the one with the scroll or if they just assumed that I was the weakest. Probably that shit about obnoxious coloured shinobi and such..." He grumbled. "By the way, here's the scroll you so desperately wanted." Naruto said and gave said scroll to the Hokage.

"They didn't think that they would be killed... When I was finally done with the last one I noticed that I was separated from the others. It didn't help matters that it had rained for days, making finding Kakashi-sensei and the others even harder. Besides I was completely wasted. Probably because of the fever or whatever it was... So my idea was to find some shelter to wait for the rain to stop. The rain was probably the reason for my fever. That only leaves the question as to why Kyuubi didn't heal me..."

Tsunade looked at him with a stern gaze.

"You should have noticed when they were luring you away."

"Yeah I know." Naruto said, rubbing the back of his head embarrassedly.

The Hokage nodded and said, "Good, dismissed. Remember, don't push yourself too much in the following few days. And make sure that something stupid like that doesn't happen again."

Naruto nodded and walked out of the examination room.

Before he could react a sobbing Iruka was hugging him tightly to his chest.

"You are ok! I'm so glad!" He wailed.

"Air!" was everything Naruto could say.

Iruka was hugging the air to breathe away...

"Don't you dare doing anything like that ever again!" Sakura screamed. "Yes, Naruto-kun, that was very reckless of you." Sai said, smiling for once a true smile.

Kakashi had taken out his porn again, hiding his face in it.

However, he was smiling under his mask, seeing his student was ok.

Somehow it looked right how Iruka was interacting with his team. Kakashi certainly wouldn't mind having him around more often, even though he had acted in a way Kakashi wasn't sure how to deal with...

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**Hope you liked it... Not that a lot happened in this chapter... But I wasn't in the mood to write more... Besides I have to think about what'll happen in the next chapter so unfortunately it will take some time... **

**I do know what will happen but the details do still... not exist... **

**Is it strange that I'm listening to boybands when I'm wrtiting? Most of the time when I'm writing a depressive Naruto??? **

**R&R**


	5. The One Determination

**Sorry for the delay! **

**I didn't like to write this chapter... I probably rewrote it... three times or so and then still wasn't happy with it... Besides real life is a bitch (as you probably all know XD) **

**RinaMaeuschen:** You'll see why Kyuubi didn't do that. But not now... You still have to wait some because it's something that will be revealed after a certain mission *grins knowingly* yeah a Kakashi/Iruka scene... I only wrote that because you like the both of them that much! Feel honoured!!

To be honest I have no idea how to bring them together... I'm going to let myself be surprised... (at least if my muse (which most of the time is you...) thinks it necessary to bless me with any ideas)

And Kyuubi will get to speak, yes, but not now! You'll have to wait^^

**notperfectXbutXhonestcritc: **thanks for telling me about the quotes... Didn't know that... (although I most likely have noticed it in all of the books I've read in English, but only subconsciously...). However I can't promise that I'll remember it all of the time...

And the grammar mistakes... Sorry about them... I was ill when I wrote that chapter and when I'm ill I'm not able to concentrate properly and then I make stupid mistakes... And up until now I wasn't in the mood to correct them... I admit: I'm a very lazy person...

**CoCoBookmark:** You will have to wait some to get to know why Sasuke bit him^^

**bluewolfeyes: **Do you think Naruto is intelligent enough to notice changes even if there _are _some? But you'll see^^

**Disclaimer:** not mine

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** 5. The One Determination **

It was a cloudless and late night. The sky was filled with stars, twinkling down onto the slumbering Konoha, Houses and apartments were illuminated by the mystical light of the full moon and the stars. Even the hustle and bustle of Konoha's largest streets had fallen asleep. Every last person was lying in bed with their beloved partner, feeling happiness and contentment.

A lone figure was standing at a window of an apartment. The room being only scarcely equipped, but every last item was picked with love. The light that fell onto the face of the person revealed sad and thinking features, some blond strands glittering in the soft rays. However, the saddest expression was in the cerulean blue eyes that were looking out of the window, watching the sleeping city full of normal people. Even the moon seemed to fit in, it looked like a big star.

_Nice, now I'm even more different than other people! _

_Why did he bite me? And why the hell did he put some of his friggin' chakra in me? _

_Why did he take me in the first place? _

_I mean it's not as if he found me attractive or anything... _

_So why? _

_To torture me even more or what? _

_Shit, I'm successfully making myself depressed. _

_Why did we meet anyway? _

_Normally I can do the hell knows what and I don't find him! And then, all I need to do is to be ill and I find him? How stupid is that? _

Tears started falling down anguished features.

_That's just fucking stupid! _

_Why did he let himself be found? _

_Fuck that Uchiha! _

_Why did he do that? _

_And then, why did he leave me? _

_Was I a simple fuck for him? Nothing more? _

_But do I want it to be more? Do I want it to be more for him? _

_Damn him! _

_Why is he doing this to me? _

_Why did he fuck me, bite me for some strange reason and then leave me? _

_He... He's a bastard! _

_Doesn't he know... that... _

Sobs joined the tears.

_Damn him! _

_I want him to be here! _

Legs giving out, the blond broke down in front of the window and his body started shivering, weeps shaking his whole form.

It was very unusual for him to have a break down. That went against his normally cheerful attitude. He knew that he wouldn't be able to live on if he succumbed to the daily challenges the villagers inflicted on him so he wouldn't allow himself to be hurt by them. But right no it was very hard not to give up, to simply end his life.

The villagers wouldn't miss him, that he knew.

And Sasuke wouldn't, either. Otherwise he wouldn't have left him. He wouldn't have left him all alone in that cold cave with that dreadful fever. He wouldn't have left him when they had been genin together in the first place.

Another sob shock his already wheezing body.

He knew he couldn't just give up. Giving up was like letting the villagers and the bastard win. He wouldn't let that happen.

But right now with nobody seeing his crumbling self-control he couldn't stop his emotions from getting the upper hand.

All he wanted was his best friend back.

And so he cried alone.

The only witness being the moon, illuminating him with its white rays of light.

A single, sorrowful howl was heard in the night.

If people listened closely they would realize that it sounded almost like the Kyuubi's had...

The annoying sound of his apartment's door bell startled Naruto awake the next morning.

Somewhere during his break down he had managed to drag himself to his bed and collapsed on it. Nevertheless he had continued to wail, giving room to his desperation.

Disorientated, he looked around in his room and searched for his alarm clock. Still half asleep he noticed that he had been oversleeping. Probably because of the exhausting days prior, maybe even because of the last night.

But still! Why hadn't his alarm gone off? It should have woken him an hour ago!

Trudging to the door, he opened it and found Iruka standing in front of it who had been ready to ring the bell for another time.

"You're still here. I didn't think I would still get you here." The teacher said.

"What are you doing here, Iruka-sensei?" Naruto asked, rubbing his eyes with one of his hands, the other still on the door handle.

Iruka gave him the once over and noticed several things. His former pupil's hair was even messier than normally and his white sleeping shirt was rumpled from the night.

That, however, hadn't been what had the teacher worried. Naruto had drawn attention to his eyes when he had been rubbing at them and Iruka had noticed the red rims around them.

Had he been crying? Surely not... right?

"Naruto, are you ok? You look like you have been crying." Iruka asked anxiously.

Immediately Naruto flashed him a smile and said, "Na, I haven't been crying. That's not a thing the future Hokage does. Besides why should I be crying?"

"Are you sure? You can talk to me about everything you want, you know that, right?" Iruka said.

"Everything's ok, Iruka-sensei."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, so why're you here?" Naruto asked.

"I was thinking about inviting you over after training. Eat dinner together, you know. We haven't seen each other very often lately."

In an instant Naruto was awake completely.

"Really?" He asked, his eyes filled with awe and pleasant anticipation.

A soft smile graced the teacher's lips.

"Yes. And I was thinking about inviting your whole team."

"All of them?" Naruto asked. He wasn't exactly disappointed, but he was afraid the food wouldn't be enough for all of them. After all Iruka's cooking was more than delicious and Naruto always asked for seconds. So what if everybody would be asking for seconds and Naruto wouldn't get enough?

Food was precious to him...

"Of course. They were the ones who found you. Without them you would still be out there in the open, most likely dead because of some animal that would have eaten you or an enemy ninja who would have stabbed you to death!"

Now Iruka was exaggerating...

"Ok, I'll ask the others."

"Thank you", Iruka said and grinned at his former student before turning around and most likely going to the academy.

"You're late!" Both Sakura and Naruto yelled as soon as Kakashi arrived.

"Ma, ma, I was wandering the path of life when an old lade needed help with her groceries." The copy-nin said.

"That's a lie", Sakura said, but he didn't bother to answer her. Instead he took out his porn and started reading.

The blond was not as vicious as he normally would be when it came to scolding his sensei about his tardiness. The reason was that if the copy-nin had been on time, Naruto would have been the one to be late and thus he would have missed half of the training they would be doing that day.

"We won't be doing a mission today due to Naruto's late return and his condition", Kakashi said from behind his book. He didn't even look up from it to face them while talking. "We will simply do some training. Some one-on-one fights. Afterwards we can go and eat something."

"Iruka-sensei invited us to have dinner with him." Naruto said enthusiastically.

"Really?" Sakura asked, her mouth already watering at the thoughts of her former teacher's self-made food.

"Yeah, probably worried that he won't see enough of me before our next mission. And you are invited because he still thinks that it was you who found me. Probably feels some kind of gratitude and sense of duty to thank you."

"I don't care why he invited us as long as I can get some food he made! His cooking skills are awesome as far as I can remember from our days in the academy!" Sakura exclaimed.

Naruto grinned and nodded his head. "Yeah, everything he cooks is delicious."

"Are you two coming as well?" Sakura asked Kakashi and Sai.

Sai smiled one of his fake smiles and said, "I can't turn down such a nice offer of Iruka-sensei."

"The same with me."

Naruto grinned happily.

He would get something delicious to eat while being in the company of people he cared deeply for. It would be of no importance if the food wasn't going to be enough as long as his friends were with him.

At least he tried to tell himself that the mouthwatering, absolutely yummy and almost orgasm inflicting food wasn't as important as his friends...

But nevertheless: Could life be any better? Spending time with his pseudo-family – they were as close of a family he would ever get – and eating were his most favourite things to do, after all.

He conveniently forgot about that little encounter with Sasuke.

There was no way he would fall back into his depression.

He had worried Iruka-sensei with his bad mood and he couldn't do that ever again.

"Lead the way", Kakashi said after they had finished their training, his nose still buried in his porn.

Naruto didn't need to be told twice. He started walking immediately towards Iruka's house, although slower than usual because he was quite battered after training – he hadn't been any good today, probably due to his fever.

Right now he didn't care whether the rest was following him because his mind was already set on the food he would receive.

They reached their destination only a short while later.

It was the apartment building for any shinobi that didn't want to live in the city – or couldn't afford it. Besides that the building was closer to the academy and the Hokage tower than any other apartment could ever be, so most shinobi preferred to stay in one of these buildings.

Impatiently, Naruto rung the bell.

A moment later Iruka opened the door, smiling at all of them.

After greeting them and fussing a bit over Naruto due to his tired looking form, he led them to his standard living room and to the table they would eat at.

Again, Naruto noticed that Iruka had tried to make his home as comfy and different from other ninja apartments as possible. Plants and rugs were making Iruka's house more homey and the many photos of Iruka and his students showed his affections for them.

"Dinner's not ready yet. It will still take a bit to be finished."

The disappointment was clearly written all over Naruto's face.

"Thank you for inviting us, Iruka-sensei", Sakura said when she saw the look on her friend's features. She didn't want Iruka to look into Naruto's dejected face. It would only dampen the teacher's mood.

"It was nothing." Iruka replied.

"No, Iruka-sensei. You didn't have to invite us." Kakashi said from behind his book.

Even in the house of another person he didn't refrain from reading that piece of perversion. Sakura was only moments from hitting him for it. It was disrespectful to Iruka-sensei to read it here.

Iruka did notice what Kakashi was reading, but decided against saying anything. He had just realized that even if the copy-nin was lazy, he still had to like his team. Otherwise he wouldn't go on a search mission for a missing member. Kakashi could have just given up on searching for his subordinate because they hadn't been able to find him when they had been looking for Naruto on their mission. He hadn't have to go on another trip to search for him.

But it seemed as if there was a caring person carefully hidden away behind that perverted book of his.

And because of that little fact, Iruka restrained himself from scolding him, at least this once. The next time he would see the jounin reading something like that – in front of students, no less – he would tell him to stop.

Iruka couldn't help but wonder what else Kakashi hid behind that mask.

His personality, that much was clear, but what else?

And why did Kakashi think it necessary to hide behind a mask?

Was his face ugly so he decided to hide it? Because he didn't want to have to feel these looks of other people pitying him for his face?

Or was it that his face was beautiful? And he just didn't want the stares of the other people on him, only seeing his beauty?

Somehow the desire to pull that strange mask down crept its way into Iruka's consciousness.

He blushed.

Why the hell did he want to pull down Kakashi's mask?

That was just... plain stupid...

He didn't like the other in that way!

By the way, he didn't like men in general!

So what was this stupid desire to pull down Kakashi's mask?

"Iruka-sensei? I think your food is boiling over." Naruto said, hoping to save the precious food.

Why was Iruka-sensei red in the face? Had he a fever as well? Or was it that he had just farted – although nobody had noticed – and he was just embarrassed about it?

Iruka's eyes widened and he made a bee-line for the kitchen.

After a short time later Iruka's head appeared at the door frame and he asked Naruto, "Could you set the table?"

Getting up from his seat at the table, Naruto started rummaging through various cupboards to get the necessary cutlery and some plates. This was, after all, his second home and thus he knew exactly where everything was they would need.

"The food is very good." Kakashi said.

It was a mystery to Naruto how Kakashi-sensei was able to eat with his mask still on, but the fact that his food was slowly disappearing showed that the copy-nin did indeed eat. Then again, his face was still a mystery to him as well.

For some unknown reason Iruka developed a slight red hue to the face.

But why?

Why would Iruka become red in the face?

Had he farted again? Like before?

Naruto was confused.

It couldn't be that Iruka liked Kakashi, right?

It was more than likely that Iruka was embarrassed because of the comment. Most likely he assumed that Kakashi-sensei thought him a wife or a woman because of his good cooking.

It was simply ludicrous to think that Iruka liked Kakashi.

That just couldn't be, it was just too absurd!

But nevertheless it couldn't be long for Iruka-sensei to find a partner. He was a charming person after all. And who didn't want a man who could cook? A lot of them let their wives cook for them.

Naruto looked around the room after dinner.

Sakura was complaining about Sai's behaviour and Iruka-sensei was blushing because of Kakashi-sensei's comments.

Sakura secretly liked the perverted comments the artist made in his typical emotionless voice, she just couldn't admit that deep down inside she was a pervert, too, just like Sai.

Naruto still wasn't sure why Iruka blushed, it couldn't be that he liked Kakashi, he'd already thought it over earlier.

However it couldn't take long for him to find someone. Women were probably fighting over him to get his love and affection! Who wouldn't want a domestic husband?

And Kakashi was the most famous Copy-nin! The girls probably lied to hist! He just had to pick one!

It seemed as if all of them wouldn't be alone for much longer.

Only he would be alone...

Alone without friends.

Alone without a partner.

Alone...

Damn it! Again Sasuke had managed to depress him completely.

What a bastard!

The wish to take revenge on the Uchiha for every time he made Naruto depressed made him only more determined to get Sasuke back.

It didn't matter whether they were lovers or not; as long as he would be back, Naruto wouldn't be alone any more. And that was everything that counted.

Someone would be there who would understand him.

Sasuke would be brought back no matter what!

Having set his new goal Naruto participated in the conversation with even more vigour.

**

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**

**I don't like this chapter... **

**I think it's poorly written... and nothing really happens...! **

**Instead of writing this I wrote the next chapter because I soooo didn't want to write this one... (although it's not on my computer yet... wanted to write it on some pieces of paper...) And if you give me enough lovely reviews I'll get myself to write it on my computer and then put it here!! (without motivation I'm useless...) **

**PS: Can somebody please tell me if my grammar sucks a lot???**


	6. The One Evidence

**Hi! **

**Sorry for the long wait! But finally here's the next chapter! **

**RinaMaeuschen: **I was sooo tempted to answer you in German! XD But then I thought it would be unfair to the other readers who are interested in what I'm answering you...

Yes, I do realize that you're obsessed with Kakashi^^Although you didn't write that in your review (the review was enough to conclude that!!)

And the thing with the details... I told you more than once that I don't like the previous chapter (I think I did that in school most of the time) ... I wanted to get done with it as soon as possible and therefore didn't describe for example Iruka's home more... But maybe that'll come when Kakashi and Iruka'll get it on with each other? Who knows? Give me some ideas as to how bring them together and I'll write it.

**notperfectXbutXhonestcritc:** Thanks for the review! I'm going to take care of the mistakes immediately!!! (or as soon as I get myself motivated...) And Sasuke will make an appearance soon^^

**Kisa167: **That was my intention^^ I think it would be boring if Naruto knew immediately that Iruka was attracted to Kakashi...

**Disclaimer: **Don't own a thing

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** 6. The One Evidence **

One and a half week had passed by without a mission for Team Kakashi.

The only thing Naruto and his team had been doing was simple training so they wouldn't cause Naruto a relapse.

Naruto yawned.

He had been summoned by the Hokage early in the morning, the sun had yet to rise.

Contrary to public belief he was not a morning person because of the Kyuubi – foxes were nocturnal after all – especially lately he wasn't quite so fond of having to get up early.

Standing in front of Tsunade, his vest was still open, not orange this time but green.

Sakura had used the last week to convince him to wear a normal vest. It wouldn't attract as much attention as an orange one so he wouldn't be the first to get targeted. Thus something like the incident on their last mission wouldn't happen again and Iruka wouldn't have to worry that much about him when he went on his next mission. That really was the only reason why Naruto had changed colours.

The blond's hair was ruffled and his eyes threatened to fall shut again.

One thing was for sure, he wasn't a morning person.

Furthermore his stomach was grumbling early in the morning and it was not because he was hungry. Being a chuunin had completely taken care of the food problem.

It seemed his fever wasn't completely out of his system by now... Because he **was** hungry but couldn't eat anything. He couldn't keep the food down.

And so here he was standing in front of Tsunade's desk.

He wasn't alone, though.

Shikamaru was next to him.

It wasn't easy, but he managed to beat Naruto in looking the most sleepy.

His eyes **were **falling shut, his hair wasn't put into a ponytail yet and the typically bored and tired look was on his face.

Next to Shikamaru was Ino. She looked about ready to throttle the Hokage for the early call. But of course she was already properly dressed and her hair was put into her normal, long braid.

And last but not least was Kiba with Akamaru standing on Naruto's other side.

They were the only ones that looked completely awake and not ready to kill the Hokage on the spot.

"Old Hag, what is it you want?" Naruto couldn't resist but ask in spite of his tiredness.

"Brat, don't call me that!" Tsunade glared at Naruto, a vein throbbing on her forehead.

"You are here for an important mission. A rich merchant, a very, very rich merchant, requests to be protected on his trip to Waterfall Village. Shikamaru will be the leader of the team."

"Why are **we** here and not the rest of fox face's team? Wouldn't it be a lot better if fox-face were with his team and not with us?" Kiba wanted to know.

"Of course it would be better!" The Hokage boomed. "But there is no way that can happen because Kakashi already is on an important mission. Sakura can't come because there are a lot of complex surgeries in the next time which she isn't able to perform yet and therefore has to learn and Sai is on an art exhibition."

"He's what?!" Naruto asked, now completely awake.

Tsunade smirked, then she said, "Just kidding. Actually he's on an important mission as well."

"Then why not take a team that's here completely?" Ino asked. "Because none of the other teams that is currently here suits this mission. Besides Naruto has already been there. It should be easier for you if someone on your group has already been there, given the circumstances that no one knows one hundred percent for sure where its location is."

"What do you mean?" Kiba asked.

"How troublesome." Shikamaru said, more asleep than awake.

Tsunade glared at him before she looked at Kiba.

"Waterfall Village is not a strong Ninja Village. Their strongest shinobi is their leader, who is as strong as one of our normal ninja. At least that is what our latest reports state."

"Then how do they still exist?" Ino asked intrigued.

"Nobody knows where the entrance to the village is, except for the people who live there."

"What?! So we're leading that guy somewhere into nothingness?" Kiba exclaimed.

Tsunade shook her head and explained, "No, the merchant will be leading you and when you are in a certain distance to the village and you and he assume it safe he will ask you to leave him. Besides that Naruto has been there once."

"So the merchant is from the Waterfall Village?" Shikamaru asked.

Tsunade nodded her head and said, "I expect you not to follow after him. It is not for you to know where the village is."

"But why did we have to be so early? The sun hasn't even risen yet." Naruto complained.

Tsunade fixed him with a level stare, then she said, "Our costumer wants to depart as early as possible so that he will reach his village as early as possible.

"In fact", she said, "he wants to depart in half an hour so I would suggest that you hurry and pack your things."

Groaning was heard, but nevertheless the group disappeared to do as they were told.

After all it wouldn't be good for someone of the them not to be prepared.

Exactly half an hour later all of them were standing in front of the gates, even Shikamaru was there although Naruto had doubted the genius wouldn't fall asleep again. The merchant was already waiting, his two employees standing at his sides. Both of them were to carry the merchant's goods. The sun was just rising.

The merchant was in his mid forties, nevertheless his hair was still black. It was short as was his beard above his upper lip. However his face already had some wrinkles. He wore a grey hat, brown trousers, a green shirt and a simple brown vest.

Surprisingly, he wasn't fat. He probably had to work hard for his wealth and couldn't allow himself to get too corpulent or otherwise he wouldn't be able to work properly. A merchant from such a little village most likely had to work hard to survive the hard business of the global market.

Introductions were made, then they took of at a walking pace so that the packed employees could follow.

Naruto was still complaining about the "ungodly hour" but no one else took any notice of his rant.

"Shut it, Naruto, you're going on my nerves! I can't understand how Sakura survives this!" Ino shouted after one hour of Naruto's complaints.

"But, Ino-chan! Don't you think that it's too early for this kind of stuff as well?" Naruto asked.

She scowled at him and answered, "I may think the same as you but I can live with it. Take it like the shinobi you are!"

"Yeah, fox-face. One could think that you don't like to be on missions any more. Normally you are the first to volunteer for them." Kiba said.

"Of course! I need the experience so that I can become Hokage one day!" Naruto said, already starting to grin like usual.

"Then why are you this grumpy?" Ino asked, irritated.

"Not feeling quite so well. I think it's the after effect of my fever."

"How troublesome." Shikamaru interjected.

Ino just rolled her eyes at her friend and then turned her gaze at Naruto. "But if you're not feeling well, then why are you on this mission?"

Naruto shrugged his shoulders and said, "The Old Lady wouldn't have let me go if it had been anything bad. Besides I would've pestered her long enough to give me a new mission anyway."

"I'm travelling with an ill body guard?" The merchant asked alarmed.

Naruto shot him his best grin and said, "No, and even if I were my healing abilities are quite good. I'll be healthy again in a few hours."

The group carried on until the sun set.

They made their camp in a slightly protected clearing in the forest that was on either side of the road they were travelling on, each of the ninja – and the nin-dog – taking watch in turn.

"So, fox face, you've been there? When?" Kiba wanted to know.

"Some years ago when I was still a genin and the bastard was still with us, we had to protect the leader of the Waterfall Village. He had been in Konoha for some reason. And when we reached the point where he wanted to separate from us we met two children who were admiring him to no end. We had been talked into cleaning a lake! That was soooo annoying!! And Kakashi-sensei got an urgent message form Konoha and had to return home. So unfair! He had to do the cool stuff while we were cleaning the damn lake! We should follow once we were done. After that however one of the villagers came to us, bleeding and all that stuff. Imagine how surprised we were. We learned that Waterfall Village was under attack from some rogue nin and Shibuki, the leader, decided to allow us entrance. And then the bastard and I beat the shit out of the rogue nin's leader""

"You were the little guy back then?" The merchant asked.

Naruto grinned and nodded his head. "Shibuki protected the village and tried to kill that stupid leader of the rogue nin Suien but got wounded, the bastard and I were beating the shit out of him, he fried that stupid 'Hero Water' – some stupid water that increases your chakra tenfolds... quite pathetic if you can't do anything without having some sort of drug at hand – and I made the killing blow. Man, did that Suien guy annoy the hell outta me!!"

The merchant looked at Naruto with a new perspective, not any longer with disdain and condescension, but with something akin to acknowledgement and disbelief.

Who would have guessed that the same ninja from back then was now again on a mission to Waterfall Village.

"You always were the one for justice." Kiba said, grinning widely. "That had nothing to do with justice! He was just plain stupid and annoying! Besides that he threatened my friends!"

"Whatever." Kiba said, grinning as if he knew that Naruto had done it for justice.

The group was travelling further on their way to Waterfall Village, when Kiba and Akamaru, who had been some steps in front of the rest, suddenly halted and Akamaru began growling and barking.

"I agree", was Kiba's response, his forehead set into a frown.

"What is it?" Shikamaru asked.

"Akamaru and I can smell a large amount of blood in front of us."

* * *

**SASUKE will make an appearance in about 2 chapters!!!**

**Merry (belated) Christmas!!! **

**Hope you liked it!!! **

**You could leave me a review for a present. That would be rather nice^^ **


	7. The One Mistake

**A/N: I'M _SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO _SORRY!!! **

I know it shouldn't have taken me that long... But I started writing this chapter and then became fed up with it because I suck at fighting scenes... So then I re-discovered FinalFantasy IIX... And instead of completing this chapter I was playing it... And after that I got ill (on my FUCKING birthday!!) and after that I re-discovered The Legend Of Zelda Twilight Princess... And then I got ill again... And after that I re-discovered Zelda Ocarina Of Time and then Zelda Windwaker (though this one I didn't finish...) And when I was done with all of them... I had to learn for my A-levels... And after that I was waiting for the results while doing... absolutely nothing (I passed btw). And then I was on holidays with my family...

Real life sucks...

During all of this I started writing this chapter again but only pieces... And pasted them together... And then wasn't happy with the result... And then rewrote it again... And so on and so forth...

So if it sounds... a bit strange...don't be surprised... because I finally gave up on it and just uploaded it the way I found it two days prior (but still did some editing)...

You're probably all pissed at me right now... And most likely I lost a lot of my readers because of my long absence... so again** I'M SORRY!!!!**

**Thanks for all the reviews btw! **

**RinaMaeuschen: **I had to laugh at your idea of Naruto in his orange vest, disguising as a flower XD

**greyspell:** You'll have to wait and see what the mark is... I'm not sure when I'm going to write THAT scene where everybody gets to know what it is but it will be soon (at least I hope so...)

**Kisa167: **Yes, they will meet (more or less) in the next chapter!

**RockFighterGirl:** LOL

**Biss1AntichristPlague: **yes the mission is from the "hidden episode" belated means that it's too late XD

**DISCLAIMER: **still not mine...

**WARNINGS: **GORE AHEAD!!! (at least when I was still motivated... and only in the beginning... I think...) AND VIOLENCE!!!

* * *

**The One Mistake **

_"Akamaru and I can smell a large amount of blood in front of us."_

Stepping some steps ahead, Naruto sniffed the air and almost gagged on the thick smell of blood. Kyuubi's senses allowed him to smell better than any human, just as good as Kiba and Akamaru. That was the reason why he could smell the metallic blood as well.

Immediately Shikamaru snapped to attention.

"This is so troublesome. Can you tell what has happened?"

Kiba shook his head.

"The smell of blood is too strong to be able to smell anything else than that."

"How annoying." Shikamaru said, then he was silent for a few moments.

"Naruto, I want you to make some of your clones to scout the area ahead of us."

One hand sign later a few clones of Naruto were standing around them, waiting to see if there would be any other instructions.

"Make sure that they don't attract attention. We don't want whatever is in front of us to get to know that we are here."

"Got it." All of the Narutos said and disappeared into the forest, only the real one remaining behind. He would relate whatever the clones would find out.

"And what do we do now?" Ino wanted to know.

"We will have to wait for the information the clones gather. It depends on whatever-is-in-front-of-us is in our way or not." Shikamaru answered.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Not too long afterwards the first clone disappeared and Naruto's face distorted in displeasure at the clone's discoveries.

"So what? Spill it, fox face." Kiba said.

Naruto sent him a dark look, then he answered, "Heavy fightings ahead. Can you see the mountain up ahead? In front of it they're going on. I'm not sure but I think the shinobi fighting are some of the Waterfall Village, the others I don't know. I have to wait for the other clones to be sure."

Only a short amount of time later the other clones dissipated as well, each bringing the same message, ascertaining that it were indeed shinobi of the Waterfall Village.

"So what do we do now?" Naruto asked.

Shikamaru appeared to be thinking, for once completely awake, then he asked, "I assume we are close to the Waterfall Village?", and looked at the merchant.

The merchant only nodded jerkily, clear worry written all over his face.

"Can you in any way tell me how many enemy shinobi there are?" Shikamaru asked.

Naruto shook his head and said, "No, the only thing I can tell is there are a lot."

Shikamaru thought about it.

No matter what they couldn't leave the merchant behind. If anything happened to him, Lady Tsunade would have Shikamaru's head.

But they couldn't just barge in, especially if the number of the enemies was not known. Besides that it still was unknown if the foes were missing-nin or some other village shinobi because Naruto hadn't been able to see any headbands.

And if it wasn't known who the enemy was it could very much be likely that Shikamaru and his subordinates would attack a village that was allied with Konoha but wasn't with the Waterfall Village.

If that was the case and they attacked they would be in big trouble.

A distant scream ripped Shikamaru from his thoughts.

Naruto's head snapped in the direction from where the scream had come and seemed to listen as if he was able to hear something the others couldn't.

Then there was another scream.

"We have to help." Naruto said, his gaze fixed upon the mountain up ahead.

Shikamaru followed his gaze.

"Naruto, we can't just barge in and fight them. We don't know who they are. This is so troublesome. Besides they are heavily outnumbering us."

Another piercing scream was heard.

"I can't wait." Naruto said and jumped in the direction from where the scream had come from.

"No, Naruto, don't!" Shikamaru shouted, moving to grab him but it was already too late.

Naruto was gone.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

After Naruto had entered the hidden cave behind the waterfall full of pools he dove through the one that lead to the great lake in the middle of the Waterfall Village. Once there his head pierced the water's surface only slightly to look around undetected.

What he saw was horrifying.

His eyes narrowed in anger.

Men of Waterfall Village were fighting shinobi who were by the looks of it more powerful than themselves. The enemy ninja didn't perform the killing blow, but injured their foes enough to make them unable to attack and defend. However, they were hurt enough to die a terrifying death, slowly bleeding out their lives, feeling every antagonizing wound without some kind of relief, making an agonizing process out of losing their lives.

Women, most of them civilians, had herded their children behind themselves and were fighting fiercely to protect them, but they had no chance against the fully trained opponents.

Corpses were lying around everywhere, in some cases they were mutilated to an extend where they couldn't be recognized any longer.

Then Naruto's wandering eyes found Shibuki, the leader of the village.

He was fighting in front of the large tree in the middle of the lake, an even greater number of children behind him while his former admirers Shizuku and Himatsu were helping him to protect the kids.

A great number of shinobi surrounded and attacked them.

As soon as Shibuki or one of his helpers killed one of their assailants, a new one was already there to replace the dead one.

Then the blond's gaze fell upon one dead woman. She was still in one piece but her numerous wounds told him that the adrenaline in her body had let her fight even after she should have been long dead. A thick trail of blood indicated that she had broken down somewhere else before she had crawled over the floor, using the last of her remaining strength to come to her current resting place. And there was the reason why she had fought – a dead child. A tiny boy, hardly old enough to protect himself, was enfolded in her arms.

The shinobi hadn't even stopped to slaughter a child!

Naruto was furious.

How dare they?

How dare they attack this village?

How dare they attack defenceless women?

How dare they attack helpless children?!

Without being noticed by the enemy ninja Naruto got to the shore of the large lake to where the houses were situated.

He stepped out of the water close to one mother desperately protecting her child. She did not care that she had no chance of winning the battle. She did not care that she was already injured. She did not care that the enemy ninja was using a katana and she had only a kitchen knife.

The only thing that seemed to matter to her was protecting her terrified child.

Naruto saw red.

Before anyone could react the shinobi attacking the woman had his throat sliced with a kunai, Naruto still standing behind him with the raised and tainted blade.

Blood was splashing out of the injury, reddening everything in a close proximity.

The shinobi's eyes widened in disbelief. His hands let go of the sword he had been holding and brought shivering hands to his neck wound.

His eyes widened even more before he fell to the ground, trying desperately to get some air in his already protesting and suffocating lungs, a puddle of his own blood forming around his body.

Naruto looked at him disdainfully before his enraged gaze fixed itself onto the woman in front of him.

Her eyes were dilated in shock, then the shock turned to fear.

Naruto realized that he had to look intimidating with the blood of his former opponent splashed onto him and a deathly expression on his face so he decided to let his anger rest for a while and asked concerned, "Are you alright?"

She looked at him sceptically but nodded her head reluctantly after a moment.

"Good!" He flashed her a smile.

Then he turned around to look at the other fights.

His face distorted in anger again at seeing the pain of the villagers. He made one hand sign and said, "Tajou Kage Bunshin No Jutsu."

Masses of Narutos appeared who went immediately to the fights that were going on to help the people of the Waterfall Village.

However, it didn't take long and they suddenly started to dissipate in one direction.

The blond looked up from his recent kill and in the direction where his clones were vanishing.

He narrowed his eyes.

What was going on?

An attack from behind was blocked with one of his kunai. Afterwards he gutted the foe who had tried a surprise attack on him with the other, free blade and was still looking in the direction of the disappearances.

Without caring he pulled his kunai back out, not watching as the shinobi was sinking to the floor behind him.

Suddenly a big wave of water appeared, taking care of almost all of the clones that had still been existing.

The source of the wave was somewhere hidden in the big tree that stood in the middle of the lake.

But before he could get to the tree, though, and look for what had caused the wave, creepy laughter was heard from behind the blond.

He immediately turned around to see a ninja standing in front of him.

The shinobi wore grey clothes and a headband was tying back his black hair.

"You are the one who thinks he can help this village?" The guy asked.

Naruto shot him an angry glare.

"Really? You? Alone? Without any help?" He asked. "That's not going to work. It'll be your death."

"I'm Uzumaki Naruto, the future Hokage! I don't die! I'll kill you for hurting my friends before you even realize what has happened!"

"That's ridiculous! You? Hokage? Never. You won't even be able to stop us. You're pathetic."

"I don't care what you think! You've hurt my friends. You've hurt women and kids who can't defend themselves! Do you honestly believe that I'm letting you harm them even more? Wrong! I'm going to kick your ass!"

The ninja laughed again and even harder when he looked over his shoulder to watch his companions who were slowly winning the battle against Shibuki.

The temper of the blond was raising but he didn't act upon it. He knew that he tended to mess up situations when he was angry and it didn't help anybody if he got himself killed.

As soon as the enemy stopped laughing he asked, "You dare to intervene? Although you are not part of this village?"

Naruto only continued to glower at him.

Casually the other ninja looked around. "You were able to kill a fair amount of my companions." He narrowed his eyes, his mood becoming darker by the second.

"You're going to pay for that."

This time it was Naruto who laughed. "Is this the moment where you tell me what your intentions are? Every madman is doing that before they try to kill the hero. The only problem is that they are never actually able to do it!"

The blond grinned mischievously at the foe.

"You little..."

The enemy started an attack.

Naruto was quick to evade the assault by doing a couple of back flips, landing on his knees and grinning slyly at him.

"That's everything you've got? **That**'s pathetic."

That only seemed to fuel the enemy's anger more which was the reason why his attacks were becoming more and more predictable.

He was punching and kicking into Naruto's direction but the blond got away every time or simply blocked the attacks.

The Konoha-nin waited for an opening and when it finally came he punched his enemy hard into the chest, sending him flying backwards.

Naruto didn't hesitate and followed the other shinobi.

The foe landed on his knees and was quick to stand up again, however he didn't manage it in time so the blond sliced open his throat, just the way he had done with other enemies already.

About to rush to Shibuki's help he was attacked from behind. The blow sent him crashing against the wall of a house.

The air was knocked out of the blond and his eyes widened in shock and surprise.

"Didn't see that coming, did ya?" The ninja, who had just attacked Naruto, said. "The boss isn't very happy with you, you know, for intervening with his plans and all."

By now Naruto was kneeling in front of the building, coughing and trying to get his breathing back under control.

"I have to kill you for that, ya know?"

When the blond had calmed down a bit he looked up.

In front of him stood a shinobi in light violet clothes, shoes, trousers, vest and gloves, with blue hair.

Ok, he was ambushed by _that_?

That was pathetic.

He really should have sensed that shinobi coming...

Then again he knew not to judge upon first impression...

The blond stood up and said, "Let me see you try."

The blue-haired shinobi laughed and answered, "I've warned you."

Then he attacked.

This time Naruto was prepared for it.

Flashing kunai knives were glittering in both of the shinobis' hands, clashing against one another while trying to make a serious blow on the other.

But neither of them managed to get a single scratch on their opponent.

The attacks were either blocked or evaded.

Still, Naruto knew that he had to kill his enemy and that quickly. Otherwise his foe would be able to tire the blond out so he would not be able to help the rest of the villagers, especially Shibuki who was still protecting children by all means.

It did not take long for Naruto to figure out that the other was not too strong and that he could beat him with some effort.

The next blow of his enemy was blocked, but it was just a distraction, because it was not aimed at a serious part of Naruto's body. Therefore he was barely able to avoid another punch with a kunai by making several back flips.

When the blond came to a halt he heard yet another scream.

Immediately he looked into Shibuki's direction.

One of his pupils had been injured.

_I have to hurry and kill this guy! _

"Isn't it a lovely sight?" Naruto's opponent asked, looking in that particular direction as well and grinned to himself.

"You bastard!" Naruto screamed and pushed himself towards the blue-haired shinobi.

The blond punched and kicked, sliced furiously and actually bit once to hurt his foe, not letting his fiend get to attack, pushing him back into one of the walls that restricted the village to the outside until blue-y was pushed against pure stone.

Naruto stared disdainfully, hatefully at his opponent, panting, drawing large amounts of breath into his lungs.

He was not panting because of the exhausting battle; but because he was trying hard not to lose himself in the red rage, which would result in letting Kyuubi out, transforming into it, and then nobody would be safe, not even the villagers.

When he had calmed down enough he pulled his hand with the kunai back and punched it full force into his foe's stomach, the blond's breath coming even faster than before.

The body in front of him turned to water and splashed onto the ground.

"Mizu bunshin." Naruto mumbled before he was embedded with a kunai himself from behind.

A cloud of smoke revealed a chunk of tree.

"You almost had me there." Naruto said, stepping out of the shadow of a house. "If you hadn't been breathing that loud I wouldn't have noticed you."

The blue-haired shinobi snorted and charged for another attack, completely ignoring the substitution jutsu.

But it did not go that well for Naruto's enemy.

Now that one of his friends was injured, the blond fought with even more determination to kill his foe, slowly pushing him back and gaining the upper hand in the fight.

He would have finished him off by now if there hadn't been some other, lower shinobi who came to help their companion, successfully preventing his death.

Where could they have hidden before they came to invade Waterfall Village? Because it seemed as if the ones that Naruto's clones had killed earlier had just been the first front and now the second one had arrived.

The problem with this many opponents was that he couldn't kill them because as soon as he landed a decent hit at one of them that one was replaced by another. Like this none of them got exhausted, in contrary to Naruto, who had to take them down all by himself.

Slowly, they were tiring him out.

Nevertheless, Naruto was able to evade each of his enemies' attacks so far. It seemed as if the blond was studying their movements to get a strategy.

He would never be as good as Shikamaru, however he needed to have some sort of plan or else he wouldn't survive with this much enemies.

Suddenly piercing pain shot through Naruto's chest. He had just enough time to look down and see a spear made of water coming out of his chest.

There was no time for him to react. Immediately upon notice the spear became liquid again and engulfed the blond.

_Water prison?_, was his only thought before the water froze and turned into some kind of icy cocoon.

Without further ado the blue-haired guy punched the ice cube and it shattered into a lot of pieces.

//\\

_'Shit.'_ Shikamaru thought. Naruto was gone and they didn't know where to.

Why was he always this troublesome?

The blond had probably gone to where that scream had come from.

But where was that? Most likely the Waterfall Village. The only problem was that they didn't know where it was situated.

Sighing irritably Shikamaru followed Naruto's run away path with his eyes while contemplating their situation further.

The next problem would be that they just couldn't abandon a fellow shinobi, no matter how stupid and rash he was.

They had to accept this as another mission or Lady Tsunade would have their hides, especially his own.

But how to act? They couldn't enter the village if they didn't know where the entrance was and the merchant surely wouldn't talk. Firstly, he certainly wasn't allowed to reveal its entrance and secondly he probably thought the village was still secure in spite of the scream.

Shikamaru's gaze strayed to their client and studied him. He could understand the reasons for not revealing the Waterfall Village's location but it would make it only more troublesome for them.

"We expect extra payment from your leader for helping his village." He said, still thinking about a plan, his stare not leaving their client.

The merchant nodded numbly.

"Good, we will escort you to somewhere safe. You will have to guide us, though, because you know the surroundings better than us, but don't go in that particular direction." Shikamaru said while pointing in the direction of the battle.

~*~*~

After they had escorted the merchant and his servants to some safe place and were back to where Naruto had left them, Shikamaru motioned for the other's to kneel so he could tell them what they were going to do.

"We don't have much information on the enemy. The problem is that we don't have the time to get more because of Naruto's stupid rush forward. We only know that he is heavily outnumbered and that we are going to be as well. However we will take down as much shinobi outside of the village as possible."

Shikamaru made an annoyed expression. "This is so troublesome. But we still have to help the shinobi of Waterfall Village.

"Kiba, you and Akamaru are going as a team, obviously. However, I want you to think before you act. We don't need a second Naruto in a situation like this. As soon as you or Akamaru are injured too much, you will retreat immediately and hide.

"Ino will have to accompany me for blatant reasons. She can't fight on her own if she uses her mind techniques. Besides that she is our medic and will need some more protection.

"Kiba, Akamaru, you go to the left side of the mountain and Ino and I will cover the right. Any questions?"

They shook their heads.

"Good, then go!"

And off they went.

~*~*~

Scanning the area Shikamaru removed his kunai from a deadly wound he had inflicted only moments ago.

He was bloody, but fortunately most of it wasn't his own. Although he preferred mid-range-attacks he couldn't always use his kagemane-no-jutsu.

And during all the fights he had been involved he had been looking for Naruto, but still nothing. He was not under the fallen shinobi, but he wasn't under the living Shikamaru had encountered, either.

The only thing he saw right now were the injured or dead fighters of the Waterfall Village and the nuke-nin.

The people of Waterfall Village had been surprised at first, some even attacked them because of their suspiciousness towards ninjas – after all they could be enforcement for their current enemies – but Shikamaru managed to explain the situation before anybody could get killed. In the end they were quite grateful for their help.

So if the blond wasn't here then that meant he was either in Kiba's area or in the Waterfall Village, which was, Shikamaru thought, the more likely option.

The genius couldn't quite imagine that the cry had been set loose outside of the village because if he remembered correctly it had sounded more like a child or like a women. While helping the villagers he hadn't seen many fighting females. So the possibility that Naruto was inside of it was rather high. But nevertheless it meant that the village wasn't safe, either.

And that had Shikamaru worried.

He knew that Naruto wasn't in a good shape, despite his claimings.

The genius had noticed some things that had been off about Naruto on their journey. And this off-ness most likely limited his fighting abilities. Should anything happen to Naruto, they wouldn't know and couldn't help him because they didn't know where the damn entrance was.

Shikamaru knew that Naruto had said that he had only some stomach problems that would be gone in the morning of their first day on the road.

But it was more than a problem with his stomach. And it wasn't gone in the morning, either.

Naruto was such a troublesome person.

~*~*~

Ino was currently going around the wounded shinobi of Waterfall Village.

They had to start a search for the entrance soon, even though Lady Tsunade had told them not to.

Before he could do so, however, Shikamaru barely managed to block an attack from a new enemy.

Apparently new enemies had arrived.

Damn, they couldn't be held up by this!

Naruto could need their help!

This was so troublesome!

They had to somehow save the blond!

And it wasn't for the fact that Lady Tsunade would kill them should anything happen to Naruto... Ok, maybe a little...

Even the fact that Naruto would be a good Hokage someday wasn't the most important thing.

Shikamaru had sworn he would never let a shinobi die, even less a friend, and Naruto was exactly that, a friend, however dense and annoying he may be.

Nevertheless their enemies didn't seem to become less, no matter what Ino and he did to kill them. It seemed as if they became even more.

And the bad feeling Shikamaru had about the situation was becoming worse by the second.

They had to help Naruto! Otherwise he dreaded the outcome.

But as soon as he twisted some enemies' necks with his shadow technique, they were replaced by even more.

How troublesome.

The stream of opponents just didn't let up.

Just as he was about to become desperate, Shikamaru saw a blur draw near and run past him.

Unbelieving he stared after it for a moment. He couldn't believe what his eyes told him.

Had that just been Sasuke?

That couldn't be, right?

Why would he be here?

His calculating and logical side was running wild with possibilities.

After all it could be that he was the leader of the enemies...

But before Shikamaru could worry more, the blur had disappeared into the direction of the waterfall.

//\\

He looked at the place Naruto had been standing, then he regarded his partner who had pierced and frozen the blond and broke out in maniacally laughter, his friend doing the same.

"There you go, stupid brat! I told you you would be dying!" The blue-haired ninja said. The other shinobi who had been fighting the blond laughed as well before scattering around the village to wreak havoc again. Only the partner of the violet dressed shinobi remained.

"Hey! Why are you laughing? Did I miss something?" A voice asked.

The two shinobi froze in their doing and turned towards a roof.

Their eyes widened at the realization that their opponent was not dead yet.

He, somehow, had managed to survive the attack of the moving freezer.

How?!

"That was a close one! Really, I almost didn't make it!" Naruto said, jumping down.

The two enemies immediately looked towards the shattered pieces, only to see that there was no corpse but some kind of frozen mist in it.

What the hell?

And then suddenly there was a second and third Naruto attacking from their behinds while they were still distracted by the real one.

Unfortunately for the blond they noticed the other Narutos and attacked.

Not soon after, the two extra Narutos disappeared into a cloud of smoke.

Shadow clones? That had to be the frozen mist. Just before the water turned to ice the clone must have dissipated.

While they had taken care of the extra Narutos they had their backs turned to the real one. The blond used that to his advantage.

He jumped into the air while he made some hand signs.

_So now I'm able to test my new jutsu,_ Naruto thought and grinned.

"Kaze no tsume(1)!" He said, slashing his hands as if he were slashing with his nails at his opponents. At the same time ten slashes of wind appeared, doing exactly like Naruto's hands had done, acting like claws to rip into his enemies.

The blue-haired shinobi and his accomplice's eyes widened in shock.

However, it was already too late.

The wind claws had ripped them to pieces, scattered now on the floor while several intestines could be made out in the bloody mess.

Torso and lower belly were separated from each other, innards severed from one another, spilling blood and other things, the blood rapidly staining the land red. Limbs were lying on the floor, cut off of their body, blood slowly oozing out of the fleshy stumps and onto the already tainted ground while hands and feet were scattered somewhere else. Beheaded as one of them was, brain fluids were leaking out.

With them out of the way he could finally focus on the opponents that were still attacking Shibuki. Now that he wasn't distracted any longer he managed to slowly kill the leader's assailants.

//\\

Naruto was defending himself against three enemies when suddenly an exploding tag attached to a kunai came flying and rammed itself into the ground in front of him.

He had only seconds to react.

Making some shadow clones to stand in front of Shibuki and the others to protect them from the explosion, Naruto himself jumped out of the way just in time, crossing his arms in front of his face to guard his head.

The blond was not spared of the backlash, though. It was sending him some distance away onto the water of the lake, ripping at his clothes and beating them up.

As soon as Naruto had his balance back he looked up into the direction of where the kunai had come from and discovered another ninja standing atop the tree branches.

If Naruto hadn't known that there had to be a ninja he wouldn't have seen him.

He was clad in green and brown clothes and because of that blended in completely with his surroundings. His hair was the colour of the leaves of the tree he was standing in. Besides that he had some strange shoulder guard which was sprouting three little horns.

He jumped down, landed kneeling and stood up on the solid ground instead of the water Naruto was on.

The guy looked around and took in the damage the blond had caused.

"It seems my subordinates have underestimated you."

Then his gaze fixed on Naruto himself and his expression became calculating.

Immediately Naruto knew that this shinobi was different from the rest. Maybe it was the difference in age because all of the ninjas he had encountered so far had looked to be in their twenties, but this guy looked to be in his mid forties, going by the wrinkles he could make out.

Nevertheless it wouldn't do him any good if he underestimated this new enemy because even if he were old then that would mean he would have a lot of experience. And besides that Naruto didn't like the sharp, black eyes and his strict features.

"I haven't expected Konoha shinobi to be here. However, I cannot let it happen that my plans are thwarted by one lousy ninja."

Naruto's eyes narrowed and he took a fighting stance.

The lousy ninja remark didn't bode well with him. Besides that he knew the guy in front of him had to be some higher up or Naruto would've noticed him in the tree.

"Who are you?" The blond asked, not relaxing his pose.

"How rude of me." The blond's opponent said mockingly. "I'm Tadashi, leader of this group."

Naruto sneered at him. "Then, 'Tadashi, leader of that group', take your god damned remaining ninja and get the HELL out of here before I'm going to kick your and their asses!"

Tadashi did not feel intimidated in the least and instead smiled at the scowling blond, saying, "I'm afraid I can't do that. The layout of this village is perfect. So you see I can't let the opportunity slip away to conquer it."

"Piss off!"

"No", was all Tadashi said before he charged an attack at the blond.

Not surprised by his enemy's move he blocked the assault and started some attacks of his own so that they were eventually exchanging punches and kicks, their kunai clashing and occasionally ripping at their clothes or skin. It didn't take long for their breaths to quicken.

Both of them had set their minds set at winning and neither of them was too stubborn to lose some ground to the other.

//\\

The blond had merely avoided his gut being cut open. That little distraction was used against Naruto and some kunai were thrown his way. He jumped back just in time.

However, that had given Tadashi the time to run through some hand signs.

As soon as Naruto's feet hit the ground the water beneath him started to move.

Surprised, the blond had to focus on keeping his balance, otherwise he would give Tadashi a wonderful opening for an attack.

Still, it was hard for the Konoha-nin to remain on his feet and not fall over.

But the water did not stop moving and continued shaking so that Naruto could not avoid putting one of his hands down on the water to steady himself.

When he was sure he would not fall he chanced a glance at Tadashi.

Naruto's eyes narrowed.

Why was the enemy ninja moving his hands while he had them still locked in a hand sign?

The blond's eyes widened in realization and he looked over his shoulder.

A large wave had gathered behind him and was about to fall down on Naruto.

He jumped out of harm's way, the wave crashing down on the surface of the lake, and ran over the water that wasn't used by his enemy towards Tadashi.

He, however, was still moving his hands.

Could it be?

Again Naruto looked over his shoulder.

That little distraction was all Tadashi needed.

With one move the still existing wave broke down over Naruto, engulfing him in the water so that he was without air to breathe for a considerate amount of time.

After a some moments Tadashi formed a hand out of the liquid of the lake, fishing the blond out of the water and closing it around him, forming a fist.

Naruto was coughing up water, trying to get his breath back under control.

Then he heard Tadashi laughing.

"And you managed to take out my man?" He asked amused.

"Shut up!" The blond bellowed still breathing hard. He didn't have the time to get it back under control, though, because the hand started to clench.

Naruto gasped in surprise when the water was slowly tightening in on him.

_I have to get out of here! _

The problem was that he did not know how to escape the water.

His hands were pushed flush against his sides without the possibility of moving them even one bit. Making hand signs for a jutsu was out of the question. He couldn't even reach a kunai or something else that was meant to hurt so tight was the grasp of the water. And he could not use an explosive tag. That would kill himself.

The artificial hand was tightening more and more. By now the pressure was painful and Naruto's eyes were clenched shut.

"Do you finally realize that you are doomed?" Tadashi asked while a large grin spread over his features.

"Can you feel the pain? Can you feel how it's going to be hard to breathe? Can you feel your bones slowly giving in until they'll finally snap?" He taunted.

To be honest, yes, Naruto could feel it. He knew that he didn't have much time left until his body would crumble under the extreme pressure.

And he still did not know how to get away from the hand.

Luckily for the blond Tadashi was so absorbed in delighting over the other's obvious distress that he never saw the kunai coming.

He just noticed it at the last minute, taking his hands, that were holding the jutsu, away just in time so the hand of water broke down immediately.

Angrily Tadashi turned around to face the intruder.

Across from him stood Himatsu, Shibuki's injured pupil, panting hard because of the effort while holding his wounded side.

Within a blink of an eye Tadashi appeared behind him and punched him so hard that he flew into a house, not moving any longer.

However, that little interruption was all Naruto needed to recover. It took only moments to get his breathing back under control while kneeling on all fours. As soon as he had his bearings he started running towards the shore of the lake.

_Have to get away from the water! As long as he isn't able to use his water jutsus anymore I bet he isn't as dangerous. _

But that was easier said than done because Tadashi was back to performing the water hand that was following the blond around.

Thankfully this time Naruto was fast enough to evade the attack.

He ran straight towards Tadashi, completely ignoring the wave behind himself.

In fact, he pulled one of his kunai free and threw it at his opponent's chest.

If he didn't want it to hit he would have to release the jutsu and get out of the blade's way. That would give Naruto the opportunity to get on the dry soil unscathed.

And just as the blond had hoped Tadashi dissolved the wave and got out of the way of the flying kunai. That was the blond's cue and he reached the shore within a blink of an eye.

But Tadashi realized that he was not at the advantage any longer with Naruto gone from the water. So to remedy the situation the leader of the enemy shinobi instead ran onto the surface of the water.

That did not stop the happy grin from forming on Naruto's face. He was no longer exposed to Tadashi's vicious and quite deathly water hand.

Nothing could stop the blond now from being content.

The happiness didn't last long, though. He had to come up with something that would defeat his enemy. And the best would be if he didn't have to go back onto the water to accomplish that.

Right now they were studying each other, Tadashi on the water, Naruto on the shore, looking for weaknesses in the other's defence.

Suddenly there was an explosion on his left. Immediately the blond looked into that direction to discover Shibuki standing in front of the children to protect them from the heat and the debris but as far as the Konoha-nin could see the leader of the Waterfall Village was fine.

Using that to his advantage Tadashi made some hand signs and a lot of missiles of water shot out of the lake and towards Naruto.

The blond jumped out of the way just in time.

However, the missiles did not stop.

Just as Naruto was back at the ground the next water attacks almost got the blond, but he jumped away again.

_Damn, I have to get him away from the water! And here I thought this would be easy as soon as I'm no longer on the water! _

But how to do that?

It was not that Tadashi would leave the lake on his own... That would just be plain stupid.

But stepping onto it was like suicide for the blond.

He would be on a gigantic disadvantage.

_Damn it! The fucking, flying water is not helping! _

Naruto thought while jumping out of the way of yet another dangerous missile. It didn't help him to figure out a strategy.

_He's annoying! _

And then the blond decided to do it old school.

He did his famous hand sign and again Narutos appeared.

But not just two, or five, or eleven.

No, masses of him were surrounding the lake.

Tadashi looked around, for the moment stopping his attacks and regarded the clones.

"We're gonna kick your ass" or "You suck" and even one "Your butt stinks" could be heard.

"Shadow clones. How interesting. But what for?" Tadashi asked.

Before the blond could react some of his doppelgänger were already destroyed by the water attacks.

He didn't answer the question of his enemy and instead the remaining masses were charging at Tadashi.

The leader of the enemy couldn't believe it.

Was that moron really that stupid or did he just act like it?

Didn't he realize that the clones would vanish with one simple strike?

Amused with the obvious stupidity of the blond his water jutsu slashed at the clones, minimizing their mass.

However, he hadn't taken into account the great number of shadow clones.

And because of that it was to no surprise that they slowly managed to push him back to the shore without his notice. He was too occupied with trying to destroy them. As soon as one of them vanished two others were already in the dissipated clone's place, attacking him viciously.

When he did notice what was happening it was already too late.

Every try to get back onto the water was in vain.

//\\

As soon as Tadashi was back on land he destroyed the clone that had pushed him back onto the shore.

But the attempt to get back onto water was blocked, and this time by the real Naruto.

"I won't let you get back onto the water." The blond said.

Angry, Tadashi screwed up his features and ran towards Naruto.

They started exchanging punches and kicks, trying to break through the others' defences to render him open for a killing blow.

Some steps away from each other Tadashi threw some kunai at the blond, but Naruto managed to jump back.

Having waited for a moment of inattention Naruto's enemy went after him, pulling some kunai out and closing in on him to get the blond of balance.

But Naruto saw that coming and got away again. That however didn't save him from Tadashi managing to get behind him and punching his kunai in the blond's back.

A moment later the body dispersed into nothingness. Apparently there had still been a kage bunshin Naruto had been able to use for the replacement technique. Barely evading another attack of the newly appeared blond Tadashi sprang to the side.

Naruto used that to his advantage and threw a kunai with an exploding tag attached to it into his direction.

Tadashi hadn't seen that coming and didn't manage to get away in time so that he was immersed in a big explosion.

Once the smoke disappeared there was no torn body.

Somehow Tadashi had managed to get away, probably by using a mizu bunshin...

Naruto was still contemplating that fact when his enemy suddenly appeared some steps in front of him and dashed towards him.

The blond, fully awaiting to have to block the kunai of Tadashi, wasn't prepared for a full body tackle.

Tadashi rammed his horned shoulder into Naruto's stomach, surprising him to no end.

The blond's face distorted in pain.

Still bent over his enemy's shoulder, blood started to run out of Naruto's mouth. A weak kick sent Tadashi some distance away from him.

Then the blond allowed himself to break down onto his knees, one of his hands put onto the ground to balance himself while the other was clutching at his abdomen.

He was retching, finally coughing up lots of blood, spilling it onto the floor in front of him.

Tadashi grinned in a smug way but at the moment did not try to get around the blond and back onto the water.

"Could it be that I overestimated you? It turns out you are not more than an annoying vermin."

Naruto looked up, little droplets of blood running down his chin while sending his deathliest glare at Tadashi.

He sprang to his feet and dashed towards Tadashi, landing a hit at his chin. The opponent remained standing with a turned head, Naruto's fist still planted in his face.

Slowly Tadashi turned his face back around, a furious expression on his face, his black eyes showing pure killing intent.

A punch that was aimed at Naruto's already bruised stomach was evaded with a jump backwards. A moment before the blond reached the ground he threw some kunai at his enemy.

However, Tadashi had managed to mull up a wall out of water just in time to protect himself form the flying knives.

Naruto couldn't allow himself to be distracted by his injury if he wanted to live. He had to ignore it as best as possible so as soon as he had a hard surface beneath him he jumped back towards Tadashi, flying right through the water.

Tadashi saw that coming and jumped backwards.

In all the commotion Naruto hadn't noticed that they had got near to the lake again.

He could only hope that Tadashi wouldn't use his water hand again or he would be screwed. Technically he wouldn't be able to if Naruto was fast enough in his attacks. That wouldn't give him the time to run through the necessary hand signs.

So he dashed after Tadashi immediately and rammed his own blade into his foe's back, but the body began to disperse into water.

The blond had only seconds to evade an attack from above by jumping to the side.

Using the little time that was given to him Naruto's enemy pulled out a scroll and opened it. Then he bit down onto his thumb to bloody (is that even a word?) the scroll afterwards. Lots of kunai appeared that were thrown into the blond's direction, every blade hitting him head on.

Naruto didn't see that coming and wasn't able to get out of the kunai's way.

But after a moment there was no torn body, neither on the surface nor under it. Instead of that a rather battered chunk of tree was sinking down onto the ground of the lake.

Shuriken were suddenly thrown at Tadashi but he avoided them so they slowly disappeared in the water. He had jumped into the air and the other kunai that were now flying at him were easily deflected with one of his own.

However, he wasn't fast enough for one. It embedded itself into his upper thigh, which let him take quite a shaky landing.

He looked down at his wound to measure up the damage when he was suddenly able to feel a large amount of releasing chakra in front of him.

He looked up just in time to see how Naruto ran through a couple of hand signs.

Immediately the nuke-nin created his wall of water again, which was hit and cut through instantaneously by something.

Naruto saw how his five "Tsume no Kaze" connected with the wall of his opponent.

Just in time Tadashi managed to abandon his wall and make some steps back. But again one of Naruto's attacks hit him, this time in his side.

Holding it he brought his hand to his face to examine it. A lot of blood was smeared all over his hand and when he looked down to it he saw the red liquid oozing out of it.

Realization dawned at him. Naruto was not that easy of an opponent. In fact, the blond was winning against him.

He had to figure out a way to destroy him and that fast.

Making a single hand signal to the still remaining missing-nin that wreaked havoc upon the village they came to him to help their leader. Another signal later they were all charging at the Konoha-nin.

Naruto got so distracted by the henchmen that he lost sight of Tadashi in the commotion. Even after some more searching – only with his eyes due to the enemies charging at him – he didn't find him again. Knowing that the blond couldn't forget about the leader of the enemies he focused on the problem at hand, pushing the other to the back of his mind. It would be deathly for him to underestimate Tadashi, even if he was injured. But right now Naruto concentrated on decimating the number of attacking ninja.

The blond had still enough chakra left to perform the shadow clone jutsu which helped him in getting rid of the foes. They weren't as many as before but each kage bunshin was appreciated for its helping hand.

Still surrounded by enemies Naruto fought to get rid of the remaining ninjas. Not a lot of them were left so the villagers of Waterfall Village could start relaxing soon.

He was relieved. Finally they would be safe again and wouldn't have to fear even more deaths and injuries.

And this happened not a moment too early. He was slowly starting to get exhausted. All the fighting surely hadn't helped his earlier fever.

Suddenly Naruto's eyes widened as piercing pain shot through his body. He had let his guard down in his tired state and for a moment had forgotten about Tadashi.

The blond's opponent had appeared at his back and had rammed a kunai into his right shoulder.

Still standing, pain spreading everywhere, Naruto's only thought was, _'Damn them all.' _

Behind him Tadashi was relaxing his stance, a grin widening on his face. Finally that annoying brat was done for.

Naruto fell onto his knees, the pain meanwhile exploding in his whole body.

The kunai that was still embedded in his right shoulder was being twisted and turned, inflicting even more agony in the already battered blond's body.

Naruto clenched his eyes shut and bit down hard on his teeth.

Normally, a wound in his shoulder wouldn't affect him that much, not even if it was piercing his flesh and shoulder blade, but right now the blond could feel poison shoot through his system.

Not even Kyuubi was able to heal poison on the spot.

"Fuck", was all Naruto thought before the world around him dissolved into darkness.

He had failed the villagers.

* * *

(1) wind claws... could be wrong because my Japanese skills are almost non-existent... correct me if you know better

Tell me if it sounds shattered and fractured... and if it was too boring... because the fighting took forever... and if the fighting scene is bad... But even when you do I'll probably need some more days... (probably months) to revise this chapter... but I thought I upload it so you don't have to wait even longer...

Theoretically it shouldn't take me that long for the next chapter because I've written most of it already... (yo I wrote it before finishing this chapter..._)

And a question: How old do you think Naruto and his friends are in my story? And what rank does Naruto have (not considering the fact that I mentioned him being a chuunin... I'd completely forgotten that little fact...)

**R&R**


	8. The One Question

**A/N: **Sorry for the long wait. I apologize to everybody who has been waiting patiently – and impatiently for that matter and is on the verge of throttling me for the long wait... I sort of lost interest in Naruto for some time... And then I had some trouble writing this chapter because I wanted to write something out of Sasuke's POV but then again I didn't want to reveal too much... And thus he wasn't allowed to think too much or his thoughts might give you too much information... If he's going to appear a bit... stupid... bear with me... We all know that he's one of the most intelligent people there are in Naruto XDDD

**Disclaimer: **Nothing mine.... Too bad...

**Warnings: **a bit of gore... other then that...

_**Review Replies: **_

_Fer3333:_ Sorry about that... But one reason for writing this story (besides the fact that Sasuke and Naruto belong together XD) was to practise fighting scenes... But I don't think (at least I hope so) that another one will come very soon.

_Spiritwalker36: _No, actually I wrote some stories prior to this but they somehow became boring or I got some very serious plot holes so I quitted writing them (and removed them). Acutally I've written a Naruto story previously... but like I said there were some reeeeeeeeeeally big plot problems in it... Maybe when I'm in the mood I'm going to re-write the whole thing... And you have to admit you liked Sasuke taking advantage of Naruto ;)

_All Nightmare Long: _I tried (keyword tried) not to use "blond" that much in this chapter but I can't promise anything... Hope you won't kill me for it, though, if I should have used it agan :)

_DemonKittyAngel: _I wouldn't have a problem with it but then you would have to kick my ass again and again because I'm quite lazy (as you might have realized :) )

_Thanks to the other reviewers as well!!! _

* * *

** 8. The One Question **

Sasuke looked around the Waterfall Village as soon as he had entered it. Standing on the lake he had come through he evaluated the situation.

Most of the people he saw – no matter if it were villagers or allies of the ninjas outside – were lying either injured or dead on the shore of the lake. Some women of the village were walking around the bodies to check if they were alive and if so they would start tending to their wounds.

The houses were partially destroyed, trees were cut down and were lying around and the earth was torn open. Blood and extremities were tinting the floor red.

There were, however, still some ninja that were fighting in front of the large tree in the middle of the village and some were on the shore.

Examining them his gaze stopped at Shibuki. He was surrounded by both villagers protecting their leader and their opponents, the villagers barely able to stand up against their enemies. They were exhausted and wounded. Besides their skills weren't as good as the ones of their enemies.

That wasn't what had caught his attention, though.

He had seen glimpses of blond through the moving and fighting bodies.

Naruto was here.

Walking over the lake towards the group around Shibuki and Naruto, voices arose. Most of the fights on the shore had stopped when the battling ninja had noticed the Uchiha on the lake and recognized him.

"We're doomed!" Some of them whispered, completely ignoring that they said that to their recent opponents.

Sasuke paid them no heed and continued walking towards the group.

Reaching them on the solid floor, the surrounding ninja acted like the ones on the shore. They started whispering and parted for him without having to be told to do so.

Sasuke didn't like what he was seeing as soon as all of the shinobi were out of his way.

In front of him in the middle of the group Shibuki and another man, probably the rogue nin's leader, were facing off. They seemed to be on par because both of them were breathing hard and sprouted some injuries. But that wasn't what Sasuke disliked. Behind Shibuki the idiot lied on his side on the floor, not moving.

The leader of the ninjas and Shibuki both stopped fighting and watched Sasuke walking to the blond.

He crouched down in front of Naruto and studied him.

He was still not moving.

Fixing his stare at the leader of the rogues Sasuke sent him his deathliest glare.

Their leader started to laugh and said, "You knew that guy? He was pathetic. And to think that he wanted to become the next Hokage! Ridicu-"

He didn't finish his sentence because suddenly a katana pierced his heart, his eyes wide in disbelief and lack of understanding of what had just happened.

Surprised, the remaining shinobi gasped and looked towards the unconscious blond where the Uchiha had vanished in a blink of an eye. The next moment he had appeared behind the leader of the rogues to kill him with one simple hit.

Pulling his sword out of the other's chest, Sasuke stepped to the side so he wouldn't be hit with the blood that was gushing out of the created wound.

The enemy fell down onto his knees while the red liquid tainted the floor, then he fell forwards, his body doing some last, uncontrolled spasms. After that he lied completely still, eyes glassy in death.

The clearing was silent, all of the occupants looking at the Uchiha in shock and fear – the fact that no emotions were displayed on his face didn't help any.

And then he was gone again, appearing between the villagers and the enemies to kill off the invaders.

The people of Waterfall Village could only watch on in amazement. Only seconds ago they had been doomed and now their enemies were killed on the spot, without them being able to do anything! And he still needed to kill one of the villagers – not that they wanted him to but they couldn't trust the peace.

It didn't take Sasuke long to get rid of the remaining pests. After he was done he returned out of nowhere to the corpse of the nuke-nin leader and cleaned his katana at some less tainted cloth of it. Then he returned to the moron's side.

Naruto was still lying on his side, his eyes closed.

The villagers that had fought around him and Shibuki were now slowly gathering around the unconscious form, the female student of Shibuki even knelt down next to him.

Sasuke was having none of it.

When he was sure that all of the enemies would stay down he strode towards the idiot. The crowd parted for him like earlier, maybe due to his patented death glare, maybe due to his reputation, maybe due to his earlier display.

Reaching the blond he stared down at Shizuku.

Immediately she jumped to her feet and drew her kunai while getting into a defensive position over the still form.

"If you want to hurt him you'll have to kill me first." She said.

It was obvious to Sasuke that she was afraid, her face giving her away, and the trembling didn't go unnoticed by, either. However, he had to give her credits for stepping into his way. Either she was especially dumb... or she was brave, bordering at stupidity with a certain wish for self-destruction.

"That's right. We won't let you harm him." The leader of the Waterfall Village added and stepped next to her, his presence somewhat calming to her.

The Uchiha, however, ignored both of them, not in the least bit intimidated or scared, and knelt down besides the baka. Shibuki and Shizuku took a step towards him but stopped as soon as Sasuke looked at them with his activated Sharingan.

Immediately both of them took a step back again.

Still staring at the two with his red eyes, Sasuke heard the harsh intakes of breath of the people nearby but did not pay any further attention to them.

They were not important right now.

After one final glare and the knowledge that they would stay put and not do something foolish like interrupting him he turned his attention back towards the still blacked out Naruto.

At first he studied the blond's form with his keen eyes.

The idiot's breath was shallow and his chakra reserves were alarmingly low but he couldn't make out other problems than that, except for some minor cut wounds.

As soon as the Uchiha leant over him to look at his backside, his eyes narrowed dangerously, the only sign that he wasn't pleased with what he saw.

A kunai was embedded in the idiot's shoulder.

Sasuke knew that normally it wouldn't be a problem for the other because of the moron's good healing abilities but the Uchiha could smell poison on the small bit of the blade that wasn't stuck in Naruto's body.

As he made to pull out the kunai, his hand outstretched, the gathered people gasped and Shibuki's hand stopped his, closing around Sasuke's tightly.

Immediately red eyes were boring into the dark ones of the leader of the Waterfall Village.

"Let go or I might see myself forced to kill you." The dark-haired shinobi threatened in a low and menacing voice.

It spoke for Shibuki's seemingly newly found courage that he didn't let go at that moment, but then he released the other's wrist nonetheless.

Glaring at him for another moment, the Waterfall Village's leader swallowed before the Uchiha turned away, fixing his gaze again onto the embedded blade.

Not restrained any longer Sasuke made for the kunai and pulled at it.

Naruto moaned painfully but didn't show another sign of being alive.

The blade came free with a wet popping noise, then a gush of blood splashed out of the idiot's body and onto the floor.

Ignoring the blood for a short moment he examined the poison on the kunai.

As soon as he had joined Orochimaru he had been taught to recognize toxins.

The sannin hadn't wanted his soon-to-be container to die because of a poisonous wound and had taken it upon himself to get the different versions of it into his system – literally.

Sometimes Orochimaru would test him to see if the Uchiha had learned how to recognize certain toxins and had put it in Sasuke's food – only the poisons that wouldn't kill him on the spot, of course.

In the beginning the Uchiha had been unsuspecting and had eaten the infected food but with time he had learned to notice toxin in his servings and had ignored the accused food.

The contract with the snakes later on had only helped him get a better understanding of poisons, seeing that most of his summonings were venomous themselves.

It had been quite helpful that he had been around Kabuto a few times as well when he hadn't noticed the poisoned food. Every time Kabuto had administered the countermeasure Sasuke had activated his Sharingan and had picked up how to perform it – if he had been still conscious and hadn't already blacked out due to the toxin in his body.

Sasuke narrowed his eyes. He knew the venom on the blade. It was a semi-dangerous one that without treatment would bring a slow but antagonizing death to the victim. For Kyuubi, though, it shouldn't be a problem to get rid of.

So why didn't the Uchiha see any signs of a starting healing process when he examined the inflicted wound?

He narrowed his eyes even more.

Something was wrong with the moron, seriously wrong if he didn't heal. Maybe it was the chakra exhaustion...

Not showing a sign of distress outwardly he put the kunai, bloodied as it was, into his sash and pulled the blond into his arms, one arm behind his back, the other under his knees, then he stood up.

Turning his gaze onto Shibuki he said, "I need a silent place to treat the idiot's wounds."

When nobody reacted his Sharingan began to spin wildly, sending death glares at the assembled crowd.

But before anything bad could happen the leader of the village took some steps and beckoned the Uchiha to follow him.

~*~*~

Shibuki had led him to one of the simple wooden houses at the shore of the lake that was still intact.

The little hut consisted of nothing more than one room, baring the bathroom. The room's corners were divided into four different sections. Diagonally across from the corner with the entrance door was the part with the bed. Next to the "bedroom" was a small kitchen and on the other side of the bedroom was a little sitting like room.

Once they had entered the little hut and Sasuke had taken in everything, the leader asked, "Do you need anything else?"

"One of your healers or midwives that is well-versed in herbs."

Shibuki nodded and exited the house.

When he was gone, Sasuke laid Naruto down onto the bed gently. He started to boil water and got rid of the other's vest, black shirt and fishnet shirt before he lied the idiot onto his side facing away from the Uchiha to examine the wound again.

It was starting to show signs of poison, most of it a nasty swelling around the injury. The flowing blood was another one. Of course it was a big wound and big wounds tended to be a lot dirtier than smaller ones but they should have calmed down by now which Naruto's wound hadn't. And if Sasuke wasn't mistaken than the baka was experiencing more pain than was normal.

His face was scrunched up and his whole body was shaking slightly, every so often a pained mewl or whimper would escape the idiot's mouth.

After Sasuke had cleaned the wound and taken care of the bleeding for the moment he pulled the kunai from his belt one more time to take a closer look on the toxin that was still on it. The possibility existed that he hadn't noticed an important detail about the poison when he had still been outside and under the scrutinizing and hysterical gaze of the villagers. And it wouldn't do for him not to notice something important. It could very well mean Naruto's death.

The Uchiha was ripped from his musings by a knock on the door and the entrance of a woman in her forties. She appeared to be the motherly type with a bit more fat than the average woman possessed. Her brown hair was starting to become grey and her eyes were respectfully averted so she didn't look him directly in the eye.

"Shibuki-sama said you would have use for me?" She asked.

Sasuke nodded and gave her a list of the herbs he would need for the antidote.

Herbs weren't the most important things for him to have and so he wasn't stocked on the rarer ones. Besides that he wasn't a medic-nin.

The woman bowed and left to gather the needed things.

Now that Sasuke had seen the idiot's wound and was waiting for the herbs to come he cleaned and dressed it as much as it was possible without the antidote.

He didn't allow himself to ponder about the reason why Naruto didn't heal himself or why the Kyuubi didn't for that matter.

One tiny mistake could be the death for the idiot, and if not the death, then at least unnecessary pain and maybe long lasting damage to his body.

A plus was, though, that no one dared to interrupt him.

Sasuke's earlier display of annoyance had obviously been enough to scare the villagers of and to make sure that they wouldn't come after him.

As soon as he was done with the most dangerous injury he took care of the lesser ones. Not even little scratches were being healed by the demon or Naruto himself.

As soon as the Uchiha was done double-checking the moron and knew that he hadn't missed something he relaxed some next to the bed.

Why wasn't the Kyuubi healing the idiot?

Was the demon too exhausted? Had it used too much chakra to help the blond fight earlier? But that would mean that the blond had used tremendous amounts and then, the Uchiha was sure, the mangled bodies would look much worse and a lot more of the Waterfall Village's landscape would have been destroyed.

So the question why Naruto still wasn't healing himself remained.

Reaching out one of his hands Sasuke tenderly stroked one of the blond tresses out of the idiot's pained face, caressing his cheek softly.

Could Kyuubi be tired form a former battle?

But the Uchiha was quite certain that Naruto wasn't relying on the fox's power so that was out of the question as well.

Besides Sasuke was rather sure he would've heard at least something if one of the jinchuuriki had been wreaking havoc.

Naruto's body was tense. No doubt was he fighting the poison in his system. A whimper escaped the blond's mouth.

Was there another reason why the Kyuubi wasn't helping?

Unconsciously Sasuke's features softened as he was gazing at Naruto's blacked out form, a small smile adoring his lips.

As far as he knew Naruto and Kyuubi did not have a feud with each other. So why?

His caressing hand strayed to the mark he had left, touching it with the utmost care. The idiot seemed to relax some when the mark was massaged softly.

He wouldn't allow the moron to die, no matter whether the Kyuubi wanted to help or not.

When an opportunity arose he would have no other choice but to inquire upon the demon's reason for not helping its container. After all if the container died the bijou would die as well.

Sasuke leant forwards, gently touching his lips to the ones of the blond in a sweet kiss.

He didn't take it any further because for one the blond was unconscious and two he was injured.

A simple caress of lips, a tender stroke was everything he desired right now.

Of course, he had taken the blond and would gladly take him again, but right now Naruto wasn't up for it, Sasuke wasn't one for doing corpses and he wanted the blond to yearn for the dark-haired shinobi's touches.

So right now everything he could do was to settle back on his chair and wait.

"Shikamaru! Have you seen that blur?" Ino asked, covering the genius' back. "What do you think that was?"

"So troublesome", was his answer. "No idea." He said and killed one of the last remaining enemies.

It had taken them some time to get rid of all the opponents but now the fight seemed to near its end.

To be honest he had quite the bad feeling about the dark blur but why should he tell that to her? It would only make her nervous and skittish and that would be troublesome as hell. The whole situation was already bothersome enough, he didn't need a frantic Ino as well.

Besides it was for him, the team captain, to worry – no matter how annoying that was – and for the rest to be cheery.

Three other shinobi appeared and attacked them, most likely an act of desperation, but were taken down by Ino and Shikamaru without any difficulties.

Just then Kiba and Akamaru came running back, stopping only a few steps away from them.

Then Akamaru barked, Kiba's nose wrinkled and he asked, "Who's come this way?"

"What do you mean?" Ino asked curiously.

"It stinks, and I don't mean the blood. Akamaru can smell it as well."

"There was a blur."

"A blur?"

"Yes. We couldn't see the figure properly but it went somewhere over there." Ino said while gesticulating.

Kiba's eyes narrowed.

"I'm sure I know that smell but I can't place it..." He said while Akamaru barked in affirmative.

"So troublesome." The Nara said but inwardly he dreaded what Kiba would say. He dreaded what Kiba would say once he remembered that scent.

"Where's fox-face?" The dog lover inquired further.

"He would already be back if he weren't that troublesome."

"So what do we do now?" Ino asked.

"We go to the merchant and wait for the night. We can't let him enter the Waterfall Village. We don't know if there are still any fightings going on inside. No matter how troublesome it is we have to wait for someone of the village to exit it for us to be sure that it's safe."

This was so bothersome Shikamaru decided.

He hadn't thought that this would end in being such an irritating mission. He had thought they would guard the merchant, go to Waterfall Village, deliver him to it and go back home, nothing more.

And then it all took a turn for the troublesome...

"Let's go." The genius said.

The idiot was twitching. Every now and then one of his fingers would move. His eyes were shifting under their lids. Other than that he lied completely still, his face relaxed.

However, there were still some signs that he had been suffering a lot not too long ago.

Pain or after-effects of the poison weren't the reason why he was jerking around it was because he started to wake up.

Sasuke had already administered the antidote some hours previously and ever since then he had been waiting for an indication that it had worked.

Naruto hadn't shown any negative signs, but he hadn't shown any good ones, either. It had taken the moron until deep into the night to show anything remotely positive.

He would pull through, now that he was slowly regaining consciousness.

Sasuke could leave now without regret.

Besides it wouldn't be much longer and Naruto's companions would show up. He didn't intent to be still here when that happened. A meeting with them would be too annoying to bother with so he would be gone as soon as possible.

Standing up from his chair he had used for his silent vigil, he leant forwards and pressed a light kiss to Naruto's lips. Then he turned and walked over to the door.

"Sa... suke," a croaky voice whispered.

The Uchiha halted in his steps, not turning back around.

"Sasu... ke... why?"

Facing the blond in one swift movement, he looked at him with emotionless eyes, not giving away a single thought.

Dull, lifeless blue eyes locked with black orbs.

For a moment neither of the two moved; not even the blinking of the eyes could be seen.

It appeared Sasuke had seen something in Naruto's eyes for at least a moment, a flicker of desperation or hope maybe, that made him move back to the blond.

Coming to a stop in front of the bed, cerulean eyes still looked at him, patiently waiting for an answer.

Instead of reacting to the question, the Uchiha braced one of his hands on the mattress and leant down. The blond didn't try to move away but followed Sasuke's movements with his eyes. They widened when he realized what the other was headed for.

Before Naruto could do anything the Uchiha's other hand took a hold of his shoulder, holding him in place. Upon touching the idiot's claiming mark with his lips, content whines escaped Naruto's lips while his hands were clutching at the blanket. His eyes regained some of their fire and closed out of their own accord.

Sasuke's tongue lavished the blemished skin, worshipping every inch that was marked.

In the beginning the blond had wanted to object, to ask his questions again, but Sasuke had managed to ignite a bonfire of feelings with his silent ministrations and every coherent thought had left Naruto's mind. Instead of pushing the dark-haired shinobi away he turned his head to the side to offer the Uchiha more territory to caress.

It didn't take long for the moron's mewls to turn into whimpers of need, demanding more attention. Blushing furiously, he bit down on his fingers' knuckles to try and suppress the embarrassing sounds, his eyes shut tightly.

Two twin dots of red magma observed Naruto while Sasuke's tongue worked every last bit of the idiot's self-restraint loose, sending wave after wave of pleasure through the blond's body, eliciting the most wonderful moans of enjoyment.

The blond lost the battle to Sasuke's knowledgeable nips and started groaning in earnest, his hand wandering back to clutch the blanket.

The Uchiha's mouth wandered along the moron's neck and strong jaw line until finally their lips connected for the first time. Softly nibbling at the lower lip, Sasuke enjoyed the fact that the other was pressing up against his body. Immediately, Naruto opened his cavern for the Uchiha hungrily, letting himself be devoured by his domineering tongue that invaded his cave, probing and touching everything it could reach.

His desperate moans for more were taken in by Sasuke's greedy mouth. He couldn't get enough of the dark-haired shinobi's ministrations and pleaded for more, bidding the other to take his body silently while pressing it against the Uchiha's strong chest and rubbing it sensually against it.

A hand suddenly stroking Naruto's cheek urged him to open his lust-filled eyes. He was staring into two red pools that were spinning steadily, captivating his mind.

Without the moron noticing, the crimson orbs hypnotised him. The blond's body stilled, halting its frantic attempt for attention, his hands were relaxing their grip on the blanket. Still looking into the eyes of the Uchiha, they were slowly lulling him to sleep, his own orbs drooping closed.

Looking down onto the idiot, Sasuke hovered above him for another moment and then dispersed into the cold night air.

The atmosphere in the camp was gloomy, even the morning after the attack. The merchant and his employees were worried about their neighbours and friends in the village while Shikamaru's team was afraid for their team mate.

It didn't help that the merchant was almost hysterical and was grating on Shikamaru's already strained nerves. He was rambling on and on about the possible destruction of his home town and its people.

"This is all so troublesome." Shikamaru muttered under his breath, stirring the fire to start making breakfast.

Ino was currently on guard duty while Kiba and Akamaru were scouting the area. Maybe the two dogs would find some survivors that were escaping the village or anything similar. Secretly he hoped for something like that because then they could ascertain the situation in the village.

Shikamaru couldn't wait to be back home. There he could watch the clouds and sleep as long as he wanted – uninterrupted.

Suddenly a branch cracked.

Looking up from the fire, his gaze was turned into the direction of the sound.

Kiba and Akamaru were returning with someone the genius didn't know.

"Hey Shikamaru!" Kiba shouted.

So troublesome. It was early in the morning. Why did he have to be so loud already?

The Nara stood up and went to the Inuzuka in a sluggish manner, hands in his pockets.

"What is it?" Shikamaru asked when he faced them.

"I met this girl when I was scouting the area. She wanted to be brought to you."

The genius studied her. Her pink dress-like costume was rumpled, battered and stained with blood while her formerly white trousers were dirtied with the red liquid and muddied. Her two brown pigtails were messy and her face had some scratches. Her whole posture seemed to be exhausted.

"What do you want?" He asked bored.

"Are you the leader of this group?" She asked.

"This is so troublesome. What do you think?"

It was obvious, was it not? After all Kiba had taken her to him, the leader of the group, at her request and had even talked to said leader!

"I'm Shizuku. I'm a pupil of Shibuki-sama, the leader of the Waterfall Village."

"How's the situation?" Shikamaru asked.

She examined the genius. "You were the ones who have killed the ninja nearby?"

Shikamaru nodded his head.

She probably wanted to make sure that the Nara and his group were on their side.

"The situation is back under control. We have a lot of injured but only a few casualties thanks to Naruto-nii-chan. He just came out of nowhere and started helping defeat the enemies. Without him we wouldn't have survived like this. And then Shibuki-sama figured that he wouldn't be alone and sent some of us out to check the situation outside of Waterfall Village and to look for some of his friends. And besides that we were waiting for a merchant and hoped he didn't get involved into anything."

It just figured that Naruto had someone in the Waterfall Village that was looking up to him. He had someone like that almost everywhere.

"We are guarding your merchant. Naruto ran to your aid as soon as he heard the screams." Ino said who had just joined the Nara. "Nothing has happened to the merchant."

"Really?" The girl asked with wide, unbelieving eyes.

They nodded.

"Good, as soon as I know that he's really ok I'm ordered to take you to Naruto after you've taken a vow not to tell a living soul where the Waterfall Village is located. He needs your help. We were hoping you had a medic with you."

A feeling of foreboding settled into the group's hearts.

"Naruto's in here. He has suffered a wound that keeps him down." Shibuki-sama said once they stood in front of a small, wooden hut.

Upon their arrival in Waterfall Village and way to Naruto's residence the young leader had first introduced himself to Shikamaru's group and then had told them about what had happened.

The leader's features were solemn and showed the concern for his people. If he were able to he would take the sufferings of his village upon himself, but alas he couldn't.

Shikamaru could see that Ino's fingers were itching to help the injured people lying around the village, but they were not their main concern right now and Ino knew that, no matter how hard it was on her.

When they entered the small house Ino went to the blond immediately as soon as she saw him and started to examine him.

Meanwhile Kiba and Akamaru were scowling and growling, but Shikamaru, who had taken to leaning against a wall, didn't know why. And to be quite franc, it was too troublesome to think about any reasons that could have them that agitated.

Instead of contemplating about said reasons he longed for a smoke to calm his nerves. It would make this whole mess a lot more bearable – not less bothersome, mind you, but more bearable!

This whole mission had turned out to be more trouble than was worth it.

Turning back around to look at Shikamaru, Ino had a frown on her forehead, marring her features.

That could only mean something troublesome, the Nara was sure of it.

"He has some wounds but they aren't serious", Ino started to explain. "However, he has a bite wound on his neck which I can't heal. Furthermore he has a wound in his left shoulder that normally shouldn't be a problem for him. That's only the minor problem, though. He has been poisoned by some toxin that shouldn't be known to a mere midwife or a mere healer and nonetheless I find the correct antidote. It's one of those Sakura brought back from the rescuing mission of the Kazekage."

Shikamaru frowned, the wheels in his head turning.

"It was designed by Sasori of the Red Sand. That's the reason normal people don't encounter it normally."

The frown on Shikamaru's faced deepened.

What was going on? He didn't believe that the Waterfall Village had the knowledge to counteract it. There were only few – at least of which Shikamaru knew – who could treat a poison as such, and all of those people were no mere medic-nin. Their abilities in medical ninjutsu were advanced and Shikamaru didn't think the Waterfall had someone that knowledgeable amidst its people.

This was so troublesome.

Suddenly Akamaru barked and Kiba's growling became even louder, ripping the Nara from his musings. Looking in their direction, the genius noticed Kiba's features were distorted in distaste while Akamaru's hackles were rising.

"What is it?"

After another meaningful bark Kiba said, still scowling, "Akamaru and I finally recognized the scent."

Shikamaru raised an eyebrow.

"It's Sasuke's."

He had feared it.

"So troublesome."

He turned to face Shibuki.

"What did Uchiha Sasuke have to do in this village? If you give him shelter you are considered a threat or even an enemy to Konoha." Shikamaru said seriously.

The young leader moved his hands in a calming motion and said, "Nothing like that. We were in the midst of battle still when he suddenly appeared. Naruto had just been stabbed I think. And afterwards he took care of him. We didn't trust him so I hoped we would find some friends or allies of Naruto that could ascertain that he would be fine. Don't get me wrong, this village is no friend of Uchiha Sasuke but if he truly wanted to he probably could have killed the whole village. We are only a small village and therefore pose no threat for him."

"So Sasuke has been the one to treat Naruto's wounds?" Ino asked, slightly incredulous.

Shibuki nodded, "He asked for someone who knew about herbs so I would think yes."

"But why haven't Naruto's wounds healed already? I had the impression that normally he wouldn't need as long to heal as other people."

Now that Ino mentioned it...

That was a good question.

In normal circumstances the Kyuubi took care of all of Naruto's wounds so why not now? What was the problem?

This was so troublesome.

Shikamaru didn't want to have to think about it.

But if it affected the mission he had no other choice.

Why wasn't anything ever easy with Naruto and the demon?

Someone moaned.

Immediately all eyes were fixed on the blond.

He was gaining consciousness and fought the last remains of the darkness still looming at the corners of his awareness. Opening his eyes seemed to be quite an ordeal because his lids were twitching, but not opening.

Patiently, Shikamaru remained leaning against the wall. If Naruto was already this far, it wouldn't take long for him to be completely awake.

The others' gazes were glued to him, waiting with baited breath for him to wake up. They wanted to make sure that he was truly ok. The easiest method would be to observe his behaviour when under the living.

And then Naruto tried to sit up with his eyes still closed but failed miserably.

"Fucking bastards!" He shouted angrily.

Ino was at his side instantly.

"Easy there. Don't push yourself too much." She chided him gently. "The poison is still too prominent in your system."

That didn't stop him from attempting to sit up. Ino lent him a hand once she realized she wouldn't be able to stop him from doing it nevertheless and after several tries he finally managed to with her help. He opened his eyes and looked around, disorientated, and as soon as he tried to move his arm – who knew what ever for – he shuddered in pain due to his injured shoulder.

Looking down at it, puzzled, he seemed to try to remember where the injury came from.

"Naruto, do you remember what happened?" Shikamaru asked.

Startled, the blond looked up, searching frantically for the body to the voice that had spoken.

At first he didn't appear to be able to see anyone besides Ino – his eyes focused on her for a moment – but even with her he had to narrow his eyes to recognize her.

So the toxin even influenced his sight. How troublesome.

Ino had reached the same conclusion and pinpointed Shikamaru for Naruto.

It took some time for his eyes to focus on the Nara, but once recognition dawned he said, "I remember beating the shit out of Tadashi."

The occupants of the little house gave him confused glances and Ino asked, "Who's that?"

"The leader of the bastards that attacked the Waterfall." Then his eyes grew worried. "How's everyone? Nobody's seriously hurt, right?"

"There are some injures but nothing more." Shibuki said smoothly, not mentioning that there had been indeed some deaths.

But then again, Shikamaru mused, that it wasn't good to excite a wounded person. It would only worsen their state.

"Shibuki?" The blond asked uncertainly, his eyes helplessly scanning his surroundings, searching for him. "Nothing happened to you?"

The leader gave him a small smile and said, "No, thanks to you everything is alright."

Kiba huffed. "Thanks, fox-face, that you've asked how we're doing. You know, you aren't the only one who had to fight."

Naruto looked at the Inuzuka and said, "Yeah, but I know that Shikamaru wouldn't let you die."

"Why you-"

"Stop it, Kiba. Don't agitate him. He's injured and needs all the rest he can get with all the poison in him. Your constant bickering won't help him." Ino scolded the dog lover. Then she turned back around to look at the blond and asked, "The bite wound, from where's that?"

Surprised, Naruto's eyes widened for a moment, his hand flying to cup his mark. His gaze turned distant, a sad expression sneaking onto his features.

"Didn't Granny Tsunade tell you? It's from my last mission. Nothing to be concerned of."

"Then why can't I heal it?" She inquired.

Naruto wanted to shrug but remembered his wound and said instead, "Don't know but it's not harming me. The old hag said she couldn't get rid of it without damaging me permanently so she let it be."

"Don't you think it effects your healing abilities?" Shikamaru asked.

The blond looked questioningly at the Nara. "As far as I know you didn't have this wound on our last mission and back then you were still healing properly – for your standards. And now you have it and you don't heal." The genius explained. "Tell us, where did you get the bite from?"

"None of your business." The blond replied absent-mindedly.

"Tell me, does it have anything to do with Sasuke?"

Naruto's eyes widened.

"Why should it?"

"He was here. Do you remember?" Shikamaru asked.

The blond's eyes grew distant again.

"I... I thought it was a dream..."

"You aren't able to distinguish between dreams and reality? Take a whiff, fox-face! This room REAKS of him!" Kiba exclaimed.

Cerulean blue eyes glared at the Inuzuka.

"Shut the hell up! I have some other problems right now! I have no idea what's up with my bloody body so don't ask! Something strange is happening inside of me and I have no idea what! So don't the fucking hell try to tell me what I have to notice and what not! I can't even speak with Kyuubi properly any longer! Have you any idea how disturbing it is to not hear something any longer to which you were used to for a very long time? Right now I don't fucking care why Sasuke-fucking-bastard was here so shut the fuck up!"

By now Naruto was panting, clutching the arm of his injured shoulder.

Ino laid a calming hand onto the blond's good shoulder while facing Kiba angrily, "Shut up, Kiba! If you only agitate Naruto you have to leave this room! I'll kick your ass if you excite him even more."

The Inuzuka took a step back, intimidated, his tail between his legs.

"What do you mean you can't hear him any longer?" Shikamaru asked, feeling a headache coming on.

Embarrassed, Naruto looked down onto his hands lying in his lap and explained, "I've been able to talk to the fox ever since my training with ero-sennin first started. Then again he's always been there, I guess. Recently he becomes blurry when we talk and most of the time he disappears in the middle of a conversation."

"Since when do you have these problems with Kyuubi?" Shikamaru asked, his mind reeling.

Naruto thought for a moment before he answered, "Since about... a week I think."

No matter how hard he thought about it nothing came to mind. After all it could be a simple virus that was attacking the Kyuubi and not Naruto... Or one of the ninja of Naruto's last mission had performed a strange jutsu on him that only took effect now... Or Kyuubi merging with Naruto... Or anything else, really. With Naruto one could never be too sure about anything at all...

"You will have to tell Tsunade-sama and Jiraiya-sama about this problem." Shikamaru finally said.

Naruto groaned. "Do I have to?"

"If you don't tell them I will." Shikamaru said seriously, then added in an annoyed tone, "You are so troublesome."

The blond laughed a little embarrassed but didn't say anything else.

Shikamaru turned to Ino and asked, "When will he be able to travel?"

The Yamanaka considered his question and finally answered, "Since somebody has taken good care of him, which I didn't expect, we will be able to head back home in 3 days. However, we shouldn't push him or he'll have a relapse."

* * *

I hope that the wannabe... kiss scene wasn't that bad... When I wrote that I wasn't exactly in the mood and actually it shouldn't have gotten that out of hand. It should have been a simple kiss ... But then it developed to... that... and then I re-wrote it about a dozen times because I wasn't happy with it... Y_Y (that wasn't my biggest problem, though. My biggest problem was the rest of the chapter XD)

Oh and I have no idea what to do with the next chapter... **Ideas are apreciated!!!!**

Hope you enjoyed it nonetheless XD

**_Important_: **I'm going to Great Britain for 4 months from friday (the 19th) on... And there I'm going to live on campus... And on campus I'll only have limited internet access... Imagine which pages are going to be restricted... V_V So this means there won't be any updates any time soon...

I'm home though during Easter break but I don't know how creative and motivated I'm going to be without any shonen-ai/yaoi stories to read... We'll have to see

R&R


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